The Wisdom of Winston Churchill 4

A nation that forgets its past has no future.

Everyone can recognize history when it happens. Everyone can recognize history after it has happened; but it is only the wise man who knows at the moment what is vital and permanent, what is lasting in memorable.

Those who seek to plan the future should not forget the inheritance they have received from the past, for it is only by studying the past as well as drawing for the future that the story of man's struggle can be understood.

Nourish your hopes that do not overlook realities.

The human race cannot make progress without idealism, but it dealers them at other people's expense... cannot be regarded as its highest or noblest form.

Imagination, without deep in full knowledge, is a snare.

Individualism offers and infinitely graduated and infinitely varied system of records for genius, for enterprise, for exertion, for industry, for faithfulness, for thrift. Socialism destroys all this.

Innovation of course involves experiment. Experiments may or may not be fruitful.

On international law: Humanity, not legality, must be our guide.

What the horn is to rhinoceros, what the sting is to the wasp, the Mohammadan faith is to the Arabs.

It is a fine thing to be honest, but is also very important to be right.

Source: The Wit & Wisdom of Winston Churchill: A Treasury of More Than 1,000 Quotations and Anecdotes (1994) by James C. Humes.