Quotes about retreat

A collection of quotes on the topic of retreat, world, likeness, life.

Quotes about retreat

Fernando Pessoa photo
Sun Tzu photo

“Build your opponent a golden bridge to retreat across.”

Sun Tzu (-543–-495 BC) ancient Chinese military general, strategist and philosopher from the Zhou Dynasty

This has appeared as a variant of Sun Tzu's assertion to "leave a way of escape." Tu Mu, commenting on Sun Tzu, advises, "Show him there is a road to safety..." Ch. 7; it has also recently appeared on the internet attributed to Scipio Africanus, but without citation.
Disputed

Heydar Aliyev photo
Sun Tzu photo

“The general who advances without coveting fame and retreats without fearing disgrace, whose only thought is to protect his country and do good service for his sovereign, is the jewel of the kingdom.”

Sun Tzu (-543–-495 BC) ancient Chinese military general, strategist and philosopher from the Zhou Dynasty

Source: The Art of War, Chapter X · Terrain

George Orwell photo

“One always abandons something in retreat. Look at Napoleon at the Beresina! He abandoned his whole army.”

Source: Down and out in Paris and London (1933), Ch. 7; a remark by Boris

Derek Landy photo

“We're not retreating, we're advancing in reverse.' --Skulduggery Pleasant”

Derek Landy (1974) Irish children's writer

Source: Playing with Fire

Cassandra Clare photo
C.G. Jung photo
John Cleese photo
Steven Weinberg photo

“One of the great achievements of science has been, if not to make it impossible for intelligent people to be religious, then at least to make it possible for them not to be religious. We should not retreat from this accomplishment.”

Steven Weinberg (1933) American theoretical physicist

Address at the Conference on Cosmic Design, American Association for the Advancement of Science, Washington, D.C. (April 1999)

Vladimir Lenin photo
Hugh Downs photo
Emil M. Cioran photo
Ferdinand Foch photo

“My centre is giving way, my right is retreating, situation excellent, I am attacking.”

Ferdinand Foch (1851–1929) French soldier and military theorist

Mon centre cède, ma droite recule, situation excellente, j'attaque.
Message to Marshal Joseph Joffre during the First Battle of the Marne (8 September 1914), as quoted in Foch : Le Vainqueur de la Guerre (1919) by Raymond Recouly, Ch. 6

Galileo Galilei photo

“It seems to me proper to adorn the Author's thought here with its conformity to a conception of Plato's regarding the determination of the various speeds of equable motion in the celestial motions of revolution. …he said that God, after having created the movable celestial bodies, in order to assign to them those speeds with which they must be moved perpetually in equable circular motion, made them depart from rest and move through determinate spaces in that natural straight motion in which we sensibly see our moveables to be moved from the state of rest, successively accelerating. And he added that these having been made to gain that degree [of speed] which it pleased God that they should maintain forever, He turned their straight motion into circulation, the only kind [of motion] that is suitable to be conserved equably, turning always without retreat from or approach toward any pre-established goal desired by them. The conception is truly worthy of Plato, and it is to be more esteemed to the extent that its foundations, of which Plato remained silent, but which were discovered by our Author in removing their poetical mask or semblance, show it the guise of a true story.”

Galileo Galilei (1564–1642) Italian mathematician, physicist, philosopher and astronomer

I. Bernard Cohen's thesis: Galileo believed only circular (not straight line) motion may be conserved (perpetual), see The New Birth of Physics (1960).
Sagredo, Day Four, Stillman Drake translation (1974) pp.283-284
Dialogues and Mathematical Demonstrations Concerning Two New Sciences (1638)

Frida Kahlo photo
Georgy Zhukov photo
José Saramago photo
Marquis de Sade photo

“The Duc, pike aloft, closed in upon Augustine; he brayed, he swore, he waxed unreasonable, and the poor little thing, all atremble, retreated like a dove before the bird of prey ready to pounce upon it.”

Le duc, le vit en l'air, serrait Augustine de bien près; il braillait, il jurait, il déraisonnait, et la pauvre petite, toute tremblante, se reculait toujours, comme la colombe devant l'oiseau de proie qui la guette et qui est près d'en faire sa capture.
The Second Day
The 120 Days of Sodom (1785)

Theodor W. Adorno photo
Vasily Chuikov photo

“I would not have believed such an inferno could open up on earth. Men died but they did not retreat.”

Vasily Chuikov (1900–1982) Soviet military commander

Quoted in "Europe in Our Time, 1914 to the Present" - Page 571 - by Robert Reinhold Ergang - Europe - 1953

Jean-François Lyotard photo
Barack Obama photo
Tawakkol Karman photo
Ronald Reagan photo

“Admittedly there is a risk in any course we follow other than this [surrender], but every lesson in history tells us that the greater risk lies in appeasement, and this is the specter our well-meaning liberal friends refuse to face — that their policy of accommodation is appeasement, and it gives no choice between peace and war, only between fight and surrender. If we continue to accommodate, continue to back and retreat, eventually we have to face the final demand — the ultimatum. And what then? When Nikita Khrushchev has told his people he knows what our answer will be? He has told them that we are retreating under the pressure of the Cold War, and someday when the time comes to deliver the final ultimatum, our surrender will be voluntary because by that time we will have weakened from within spiritually, morally, and economically. He believes this because from our side he has heard voices pleading for "peace at any price" or "better Red than dead," or as one commentator put it, he would rather "live on his knees than die on his feet." And therein lies the road to war, because those voices don't speak for the rest of us. You and I know and do not believe that life is so dear and peace so sweet as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery. If nothing in life is worth dying for, when did this begin — just in the face of this enemy?”

Ronald Reagan (1911–2004) American politician, 40th president of the United States (in office from 1981 to 1989)

1960s, A Time for Choosing (1964)

Joseph Stalin photo

“This leads to the conclusion, it is time to finish retreating. Not one step back! Such should now be our main slogan. … Henceforth the solid law of discipline for each commander, Red Army soldier, and commissar should be the requirement — not a single step back without order from higher command.”

Joseph Stalin (1879–1953) General secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union

"The Order of the National Commissar for the Defense of the Soviet Union" (28 July 1942) Moscow http://www.stalingrad-info.com/order227.htm
Stalin's speeches, writings and authorised interviews

Georgy Zhukov photo

“And now German generals find it hard to explain away their retreat.”

Georgy Zhukov (1896–1974) Marshal of the Soviet Union

Quoted in "These are the Russians" - Page 131 - by Richard Edward Lauterbach - 1945

Miyamoto Musashi photo
Barack Obama photo
Cassandra Clare photo

“But of course you should have retreated at once from the dominant male. Are you an idiot? You are extremely lucky he was distracted from ripping out your throat by the fruit. He thought you were trying to steal his females.”

"Pardon me, but we did not have the time to exchange that kind of personal information. I could not have known! Moreover, I wish to assure both of you that I did not make any amorous advances on female monkeys. [...] I didn't actually see any, so I didn't get the chance."
Giulana and Magnus Bane in 1791, p. 13.
The Bane Chronicles, What Really Happened in Peru (2013)

Nikola Tesla photo

“One afternoon, which is ever present in my recollection, I was enjoying a walk with my friend in the city park and reciting poetry. At that age I knew entire books by heart, word for word. One of these was Goethe's Faust. The sun was just setting and reminded me of a glorious passage:
Sie rückt und weicht, der Tag ist überlebt,
Dort eilt sie hin und fördert neues Leben.
O! daß kein Flügel mich vom Boden hebt,
Ihr nach und immer nach zu streben!
Ein schöner Traum, indessen sie entweicht.
Ach! zu des Geistes Flügeln wird so leicht
Kein körperlicher Flügel sich gesellen![The glow retreats, done is the day of toil;
It yonder hastes, new fields of life exploring;
Ah, that no wing can lift me from the soil
Upon its track to follow, follow soaring!
A glorious dream! though now the glories fade.
Alas! the wings that lift the mind no aid
Of wings to lift the body can bequeath me.
(tr. Bayard Taylor)
As I uttered these inspiring words the idea came like a flash of lightning and in an instant the truth was revealed. I drew with a stick on the sand the diagram shown six years later in my address before the American Institute of Electrical Engineers, and my companion understood them perfectly. The images I saw were wonderfully sharp and clear and had the solidity of metal and stone, so much so that I told him, "See my motor here; watch me reverse it."”

Nikola Tesla (1856–1943) Serbian American inventor

I cannot begin to describe my emotions. Pygmalion seeing his statue come to life could not have been more deeply moved. A thousand secrets of nature which I might have stumbled upon accidentally, I would have given for that one which I had wrested from her against all odds and at the peril of my existence …

On the Invention of the Induction Motor
My Inventions (1919)

Attila photo

“Use your enemy's weaknesses to your advantage. On the other hand, if your enemy is too strong, retreat and act again on the day you conquer it.”

Attila (406–453) King of the Hunnic Empire

Turkish Wikipedia
https://quotestats.com/topic/attila-hun-quotes/

Robert Greene photo
Charles Bukowski photo
Nick Hornby photo
Jonathan Stroud photo
Anaïs Nin photo
Cheryl Strayed photo

“Alone had always felt like an actual place to me, as if it weren’t a state of being, but rather a room where I could retreat to be who I really was.”

Variant: Alone had always felt like an actual place to me, as if it weren't a state of being, but rather a room where I could retreat to be who I really was.
Source: Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail

Norman Mailer photo

“Every moment of one's existence one is growing into more or retreating into less. One is always living a little more or dying a little bit.”

"Hip, Hell, and the Navigator" in Western Review No. 23 (Winter 1959); republished in Conversations with Norman Mailer (1988) edited by J. Michael Lennon.
Source: Advertisements for Myself

Diana Gabaldon photo
Cassandra Clare photo

“Every time I annoy him, he retreats into his No Mundanes Allowed tree house.”

Simon to Clary, pg. 151
Variant: Every time I annoy him, he retreats into his No Mundanes Allowed tree house.
Source: The Mortal Instruments, City of Ashes (2008)

Richelle Mead photo
Chuck Palahniuk photo
F. Scott Fitzgerald photo

“They were careless people… they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the mess they had made….”

Variant: They were careless people, Tom and Daisy—they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness, or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the mess they had made.
Source: The Great Gatsby

Steven Erikson photo
Alan Moore photo
Marcus Aurelius photo
Paulo Coelho photo
Marya Hornbacher photo
William Lloyd Garrison photo

“I am in earnest — I will not equivocate — I will not excuse — I will not retreat a single inch — AND I WILL BE HEARD.”

William Lloyd Garrison (1805–1879) American journalist

"To the Public", No. 1 (1 January 1831) http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/aia/part4/4h2928t.html
The Liberator (1831 - 1866)
Context: I am aware that many object to the severity of my language; but is there not cause for severity? I will be as harsh as truth, and as uncompromising as justice. On this subject, I do not wish to think, or to speak, or write, with moderation. No! no! Tell a man whose house is on fire to give a moderate alarm; tell him to moderately rescue his wife from the hands of the ravisher; tell the mother to gradually extricate her babe from the fire into which it has fallen; — but urge me not to use moderation in a cause like the present. I am in earnest — I will not equivocate — I will not excuse — I will not retreat a single inch — AND I WILL BE HEARD. The apathy of the people is enough to make every statue leap from its pedestal, and to hasten the resurrection of the dead.

Aphra Behn photo

“…that perfect Tranquillity of Life, which is no where to be found, but in retreat, a faithful Friend and a good Library…”

Aphra Behn (1640–1689) British playwright, poet, translator and fiction writer

The Lucky Mistake (1689).
Source: The Lucky Chance, Or, the Alderman's Bargain

Bernhard Schlink photo

“Because no retreat from the world can mask what is in your face.”

Source: Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West

Zeev Sternhell photo
Ted Budd photo
Garry Kasparov photo
Dietrich Bonhoeffer photo
Nicolas Chamfort photo

“People are always annoyed by men of letters who retreat from the world; they expect them to continue to show interest in society even though they gain little benefit from it. They would like to force them be present when lots are being drawn in a lottery for which they have no tickets.”

Nicolas Chamfort (1741–1794) French writer

On se fâche souvent contre les Gens de Lettres qui se retirent du monde. On veut qu'ils prennent intérêt à la Société dont ils ne tirent presque point d'avantage. On veut les forcer d'assister éternellement aux tirages d'une loterie où ils n'ont point de billet.
Maximes et Pensées (Van Bever, Paris :1923), #447
Reflections

Chris Hedges photo
Winston S. Churchill photo
Vasily Chuikov photo

“The heavy casualties, the constant retreat, the shortage of food and munitions, the difficulty of receiving reinforcements… all this had a very bad effect on morale. Many longed to get across the Volga, to escape the hell of Stalingrad.”

Vasily Chuikov (1900–1982) Soviet military commander

Quoted in "Ivan's War: Life and Death in the Red Army" - Page 174 - by Catherine Merridale - History - 2007

Robert Seymour Bridges photo
William Wordsworth photo

“True beauty dwells in deep retreats,
Whose veil is unremoved
Till heart with heart in concord beats,
And the lover is beloved.”

William Wordsworth (1770–1850) English Romantic poet

To ____ . (Let other Bards of Angels sing), st. 3 (1824).

Alan Hirsch photo
George W. Bush photo

“We did not charge hundreds of miles into the heart of Iraq and pay a bitter cost of casualties and liberate 25 million people only to retreat before a band of thugs and assassins.”

George W. Bush (1946) 43rd President of the United States

2000s, 2003, Remarks on U.S.-British relations and foreign policy (November 2003)

John Fante photo
Paula Modersohn-Becker photo
Joe Biden photo
Helen Hayes photo
Vasily Chuikov photo

“He ordered us to stand fast and save Stalingrad. So we knew then that it was 'do or die.' We could not retreat.”

Vasily Chuikov (1900–1982) Soviet military commander

Quoted in "Unconditional Surrender" - Page 139 - by Everett Holles - 1945

Benito Mussolini photo

“If I advance; follow me! If I retreat; kill me! If I die; avenge me!”

Benito Mussolini (1883–1945) Duce and President of the Council of Ministers of Italy. Leader of the National Fascist Party and subsequen…

Attributed to Mussolini by G. K. Chesterton in G. K's Weekly (1925), and later appearing in "Duce (1922-42)" in TIME magazine (2 August 1943), this actually originates with Henri de la Rochejaquelein (1793), as quoted in Narrative of the French Expedition in Egypt, and the Operations in Syria (1816) by Jacques Miot
Attributed

Julian Huxley photo
David Foster Wallace photo
Piet Hein photo

“Giving in is no defeat.
Passing on is no retreat.
Selves are made to rise above.
You shall live in what you love.”

Piet Hein (1905–1996) Danish puzzle designer, mathematician, author, poet

The Me Above The Me
Grooks

Alfred de Zayas photo

“Some observers compare elections in some countries with sports events, where people are but spectators. Moreover, elections must not be mere interludes for pushing a lever and then retreating to passivity, for democracy demands committed participation in the daily workings of society.”

Alfred de Zayas (1947) American United Nations official

United Nations General Assembly - Promotion of a democratic and equitable international order http://www.ohchr.org/Documents/Issues/IntOrder/A-68-284_en.pdf.
2013

Charles Darwin photo

“When the pots containing two worms which had remained quite indifferent to the sound of the piano, were placed on this instrument, and the note C in the bass clef was struck, both instantly retreated into their burrows.”

Source: The Formation of Vegetable Mould through the Action of Worms (1881), Chapter 1: Habits of Worms, p. 28. http://darwin-online.org.uk/content/frameset?pageseq=43&itemID=F1357&viewtype=image

John Fante photo
Kevin Kelly photo

“To achieve sustainable innovation you need to seek persistent disequilibrium. To seek persistent disequilibrium means that one must chase after disruption without succumbing to it, or retreating from it.”

Kevin Kelly (1952) American author and editor

Out of Control: The New Biology of Machines, Social Systems and the Economic World (1995), New Rules for the New Economy: 10 Radical Strategies for a Connected World (1999)

Francisco de Sá de Miranda photo

“The sun is high — the birds oppress'd with heat
Fly to the shade, until refreshing airs
Lure them again to leave their cool retreat. —
The falls of water but of wearying cares”

Francisco de Sá de Miranda (1491) Portuguese poet

The sun is high — the birds oppress'd with heat, translated by John Adamson in Lusitania Illustrata, Vol. I, 1842

Halldór Laxness photo
Kate Bush photo

“This little girl inside me
Is retreating to her favourite place.
Go into the garden.
Go under the ivy,
Under the leaves,
Away from the party.
Go right to the rose.
Go right to the white rose
(For me.)”

Kate Bush (1958) British recording artist; singer, songwriter, musician and record producer

Song lyrics, Singles and rarities

“The ancient usual retreat
Takes down the steps the scattering horde;
Adam again has met defeat,
Has missed connections with the Lord. But where the altar-candles die
Waits God, and in a corner prays
The last of heroes who will try
The Gate again in seven days.”

Josephine Jacobsen (1908–2003) American-Canadian poet

"Non Sum Dignus" st. 4–5, In the Crevice of Time: New and Collected Poems, 1995, Johns Hopkins University Press, ISBN 0801851165

Michelle Obama photo
George W. Bush photo
Robert Graves photo

“There’s a cool web of language winds us in,
Retreat from too much joy or too much fear:
We grow sea-green at last and coldly die
In brininess and volubility.”

Robert Graves (1895–1985) English poet and novelist

"The Cool Web," lines 9–12, from Poems 1914-1926 (1927).
Poems