You cannot be a hero without being a coward.
—George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950) Irish Playwright
It doesn’t take a hero to order men into battle. It takes a hero to be one of those men who goes into battle.
—H. Norman Schwarzkopf (1934–2012) United States Army General
Success is achievable without public recognition, and the world has many unsung heroes. The teacher who inspires you to pursue your education to your ultimate ability is a success. The parents who taught you the noblest human principles are a success. The coach who shows you the importance of teamwork is a success. The spiritual leader who instills in you spiritual values and faith is a success. The relatives, friends, and neighbors with whom you develop a reciprocal relationship of respect and support—they, too, are successes. The most menial workers can properly consider themselves successful if they perform their best and if the product of their work is of service to humanity.
—Michael DeBakey (1908–2008) American Cardiovascular Surgeon
Claret is the liquor for boys; port for men; but he who aspires to be a hero must drink brandy.
—Samuel Johnson (1709–84) British Essayist
We can’t all be heroes, because somebody has to sit on the curb and clap as they go by.
—Will Rogers (1879–1935) American Actor, Rancher, Humorist
Sometimes, when one person is missing, the whole world seems depopulated.
—Alphonse de Lamartine (1790–1869) French Poet, Politician, Historian
Never in the field of human conflict has so much been owed by so many to so few.
—Winston Churchill (1874–1965) British Head of State, Political leader, Historian, Journalist, Author
One murder makes a villain. Millions a hero.
—Beilby Porteus (1731–1809) Anglican Bishop of London
One must think like a hero to behave like a merely decent human being.
—May Sarton (1912–95) American Children’s Books Writer, Poet, Novelist
Heroism is not only in the man, but in the occasion.
—Calvin Coolidge (1872–1933) American Head of State, Lawyer
It is the cause and not merely the death that makes the martyr.
—Napoleon I (1769–1821) Emperor of France
I offer neither pay, nor quarters, nor food; I offer only hunger, thirst, forced marches, battles and death. Let him who loves his country with his heart, and not merely with his lips, follow me.
—Giuseppe Garibaldi (1807–82) Italian Revolutionary, Soldier, Politician
We relish news of our heroes, forgetting that we are extraordinary to somebody too.
—Helen Hayes (1900–93) American Actor, Philanthropist
A scholar’s ink lasts longer than a martyr’s blood.
—Irish Proverb
It’s true that heroes are inspiring, but mustn’t they also do some rescuing if they are to be worthy of their name? Would Wonder Woman matter if she only sent commiserating telegrams to the distressed?
—Jeanette Winterson (b.1959) English Novelist, Journalist
The greatest obstacle to being heroic is the doubt whether one may not be going to prove one’s self a fool; the truest heroism is, to resist the doubt; and the profoundest wisdom, to know when it ought to be resisted, and when to be obeyed.
—Nathaniel Hawthorne (1804–64) American Novelist, Short Story Writer
The world’s battlefields have been in the heart chiefly; more heroism has been displayed in the household and the closet, than on the most memorable battlefields in history.
—Henry Ward Beecher (1813–87) American Clergyman, Writer
Our tendency to create heroes rarely jibes with the reality that most nontrivial problems require collective solutions.
—Warren Bennis (1925–2014) American Business Academic, Author
The hero is the one who kindles a great light in the world, who sets up blazing torches in the dark streets of life for men to see by. The saint is the man who walks through the dark paths of the world, himself a light.
—Felix Adler (1851–1933) German-Born American Philosopher
It is said, that no one is a hero to their butler. The reason is, that it requires a hero to recognize a hero. The butler, however, will probably know well how to estimate his equals.
—Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749–1832) German Poet
A good novel tells us the truth about its hero; but a bad novel tells us the truth about its author.
—G. K. Chesterton (1874–1936) English Journalist, Novelist, Essayist, Poet
Show me a hero and I will write you a tragedy.
—F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896–1940) American Novelist
The soldiers fight, and the kings are heroes.
—Yiddish Proverb
The hero is known for achievements; the celebrity for well-knowns. The hero reveals the possibilities of human nature. The celebrity reveals the possibilities of the press and media. Celebrities are people who make news, but heroes are people who make history. Time makes heroes but dissolves celebrities.
—Daniel J. Boorstin (1914–2004) American Historian, Academic, Attorney, Writer
One cannot always be a hero, but one can always be a man.
—Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749–1832) German Poet
True heroism is remarkably sober, very undramatic. It is not the urge to surpass all others at whatever cost, but the urge to serve others at whatever cost.
—Arthur Ashe (1943–93) American Tennis Player
The prudent see only the difficulties, the bold only the advantages, of a great enterprise; the hero sees both; diminishes the former and makes the latter preponderate, and so conquers.
—Johann Kaspar Lavater (1741–1801) Swiss Theologian, Poet
I do not like heroes; they make too much noise in the world. The more radiant their glory, the more odious they are.
—Voltaire (1694–1778) French Philosopher, Author
I think of a hero as someone who understands the degree of responsibility that comes with their freedom.
—Bob Dylan (b.1941) American Singer-songwriter
If we are marked to die, we are enough to do our country loss; and if to live, the fewer men, the greater share of honor.
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616) British Playwright
To have no heroes is to have no aspiration, to live on the momentum of the past, to be thrown back upon routine, sensuality, and the narrow self.
—Charles Cooley (1864–1929) American Sociologist
A hero is no braver than an ordinary man, but he is braver five minutes longer.
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–82) American Philosopher
The hero draws inspiration from the virtue of his ancestors.
—Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749–1832) German Poet
How many famous and high-spirited heroes have lived a day too long?
—Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712–78) Swiss-born French Philosopher
Then out spake brave Horatius,
The Captain of the Gate:
To every man upon this earth
Death cometh soon or late.
And how can man die better
Than facing fearful odds,
For the ashes of his fathers,
And the temples of his Gods.
—Thomas Babington Macaulay, 1st Baron Macaulay (1800–59) English Historian, Essayist, Philanthropist
Down these mean streets a man must go who is not himself mean, who is neither tarnished nor afraid… He is the hero, he is everything. He must be a complete man and a common man and yet an unusual man. He must be, to use a rather weathered phrase, a man of honor, by instinct, by inevitability, without thought of it, and certainly without saying it. He must be the best man in his world and a good enough man for any world.
—Raymond Chandler (1888–1959) American Novelist
Not the glittering weapon fights the fight, but rather the hero’s heart.
—Common Proverb
The characteristic of genuine heroism is its persistency. All men have wandering impulses, fits and starts of generosity. But when you have resolved to be great, abide by yourself, and do not weakly try to reconcile yourself with the world. The heroic cannot be the common, nor the common the heroic.
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–82) American Philosopher
Heroism is the divine relation which, in all times, unites a great man to other men.
—Thomas Carlyle (1795–1881) Scottish Historian, Essayist
A hero cannot be a hero unless in an heroic world.
—Nathaniel Hawthorne (1804–64) American Novelist, Short Story Writer
Children demand that their heroes should be freckleless, and easily believe them so: perhaps a first discovery to the contrary is less revolutionary shock to a passionate child than the threatened downfall of habitual beliefs which makes the world seem to totter for us in maturer life.
—George Eliot (Mary Anne Evans) (1819–80) English Novelist
All our lives we fought against exalting the individual, against the elevation of the single person, and long ago we were over and done with the business of a hero, and here it comes up again: the glorification of one personality. This is not good at all. I am just like everybody else.
—Vladimir Lenin (1870–1924) Russian Revolutionary Leader
We shouldn’t be looking for heroes, we should be looking for good ideas.
—Noam Chomsky (b.1928) American Linguist, Social Critic
What is a society without a heroic dimension?
—Jean Baudrillard (1929–2007) French Sociologist, Philosopher
In war the heroes always outnumber the soldiers ten to one.
—H. L. Mencken (1880–1956) American Journalist, Literary Critic
What with making their way and enjoying what they have won, heroes have no time to think. But the sons of heroes—ah, they have all the necessary leisure.
—Aldous Huxley (1894–1963) English Humanist, Pacifist, Essayist, Short Story Writer, Satirist
What is a hero without love for mankind.
—Doris Lessing (1919–2013) British Novelist, Poet
Mankind’s common instinct for reality has always held the world to be essentially a theatre for heroism. In heroism, we feel, life’s supreme mystery is hidden. We tolerate no one who has no capacity whatever for it in any direction. On the other hand, no matter what a man’s frailties otherwise may be, if he be willing to risk death, and still more if he suffer it heroically, in the service he has chosen, the fact consecrates him forever.
—William James (1842–1910) American Philosopher, Psychologist, Physician
I am convinced that a light supper, a good night’s sleep, and a fine morning, have sometimes made a hero of the same man, who, by an indigestion, a restless night, and rainy morning, would have proved a coward.
—Earl of Chesterfield (1694–1773) English Statesman, Man of Letters
Heroism feels and never reasons, and therefore is always right.
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–82) American Philosopher