quotations about cowardice
Apathy adds up, in the long run, to cowardice.
ROLLO MAY
The Courage to Create
Shame never came into it. He embraced his new identity as a coward. He would run in the other direction. He would lie down and cry and put his arms over his head or play dead. It didn't matter what he had to do, he would do it and be glad.
LEV GROSSMAN
The Magicians
When all the blandishments of life are gone,
The coward sneaks to death, the brave live on.
GEORGE SEWELL
The Suicide
Cowardice, as distinguished from panic, is almost always simply a lack of ability to suspend the functioning of the imagination.
ERNEST HEMINGWAY
Men at War
Conscience and cowardice are really the same things.... Conscience is the trade-name of the firm. That is all.
OSCAR WILDE
The Picture of Dorian Gray
A coward may cover the ground with his words but when the time comes to fight he runs away.
CHINUA ACHEBE
Arrow of God
I'm a coward. Only way I can do something this frightening is to tell myself I'm not doing it!
DIANA WYNNE JONES
Howl's Moving Castle
A fellow running from or toward a gun ain't got time to worry whether the word for what he is doing is courage or cowardice.
WILLIAM FAULKNER
Light in August
Haters and bullies are always cowards, you know. They like to pick on little guys.
SCYLAR TYBERIUS
Sebastian the Great
Excessive fear withers us, and the cowards are like desiccated relics of human beings.
CAROLINE REICHARD
Some Grace Under Pressure
Being afraid you'll look like a coward is the worst reason for doing anything.
JOHN IRVING
The Cider House Rules
Cowards do not count in battle; they are there, but not in it.
EURIPIDES
fragment, Meleager
A man that flies from his fear may find that he has only taken a short cut to meet it.
J. R. R. TOLKIEN
The Children of Hurin
Cowards are nice, they're interesting, they're gentle, they wouldn't think of shooting down people in a parade from a tower. They want to live, so they can see their kids.
WILLIAM SAROYAN
Madness in the Family
You souls of geese,
That bear the shapes of men, how have you run
From slaves that apes would beat!
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE
Coriolanus
There never was found a man who had courage to acknowledge himself a coward.
JOSEPH BARTLETT
Aphorisms
For cowards the rode of desertion should be left open. They will carry over to the enemy nothing but their fears.
CHRISTIAN NESTELL BOVEE
Intuitions and Summaries of Thought
COWARD, n. One who in a perilous emergency thinks with his legs.
AMBROSE BIERCE
The Devil's Dictionary
Life is too short to cower.
CLAIRE CROSS
Double Trouble
Cowards' weapons neither cut nor pierce.
MEASTASIO
attributed, Day's Collacon