“In the cycle of nature there is no such thing as victory or defeat; there is only movement.”

— Paulo Coelho , book Manuscript Found in Accra

Source: Manuscript Found in Accra

Last update May 30, 2022. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "In the cycle of nature there is no such thing as victory or defeat; there is only movement." by Paulo Coelho?

Paulo Coelho photo

Paulo Coelho 844

Brazilian lyricist and novelist 1947

Related quotes

“To be defeated and not submit, is victory; to be victorious and rest on one's laurels, is defeat.”

Józef Piłsudski (1867–1935) Polish politician and Prime Minister

(Late 1920s or the 1930s) Zbigniew Brzezinski in his introduction to Wacław Jędrzejewicz’s Piłsudski: A Life For Poland. Quoted from this website http://members.lycos.co.uk/jozefpilsudski/index2.html
Attributed

“If one thinks only of winning, a sordid victory will be worse than a defeat. For the most part, it becomes a squalid defeat.”

Tsunetomo Yamamoto book Hagakure

Hagakure (c. 1716)
Context: People with intelligence will use it to fashion things both true and false and will try to push through whatever they want with their clever reasoning. This is injury from intelligence. Nothing you do will have effect if you do not use truth.
In affairs like law suits or even in arguments, by losing quickly one will lose in fine fashion. It is like sumo. If one thinks only of winning, a sordid victory will be worse than a defeat. For the most part, it becomes a squalid defeat.

“Anyone can deal with victory. Only the mighty can bear defeat.”

Adolf Hitler (1889–1945) Führer and Reich Chancellor of Germany, Leader of the Nazi Party

“Only he who gives up is defeated. Everyone else is victorious.”

Paulo Coelho book Manuscript Found in Accra

Source: Manuscript Found in Accra (2012), About Defeat

“In order not to be astonished at obtaining victories, one ought not to think only of defeats.”

Napoleon I of France (1769–1821) French general, First Consul and later Emperor of the French

Napoleon : In His Own Words (1916)

“The history of Australia, black or white, is not only the struggle between peoples but the struggle between nature and people. Nature tamed many of the settlers, sometimes defeating them, but people held many victories, sometimes at high cost.”

Geoffrey Blainey (1930) Australian historian

A Shorter History of Australia (1994)

“The defeat of Nazi Germany signified the victory of progress over reaction, humanity over barbarism and the victory of socialism over imperialist obscurantism. This victory opened the road for advancing the revolutionary struggle of the working class, a national liberation movement on an unprecedented scale and the destruction of the shameful colonial system.”

Leonid Brezhnev (1906–1982) General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union

Cited in Behind the Scenes of Third Reich Diplomacy http://leninist.biz/en/1984/BSTRD194/8-Conclusion

“Victory over self will not lead us to glory. It is only a postponement of destruction. There is no lasting victory except for those who have faced and defeated death.”

Titon Rahmawan

“Somewhere in the world there is a defeat for everyone. Some are destroyed by defeat, and some made small and mean by victory. Greatness lives in one who triumphs equally over defeat and victory.”

John Steinbeck book The Acts of King Arthur and His Noble Knights

Source: The Acts of King Arthur and His Noble Knights

“It might be that to surrender to happiness was to accept defeat, but it was a defeat better than many victories.”

W. Somerset Maugham book Of Human Bondage

Source: Of Human Bondage (1915), Ch. 122

Related topics