William Cullen Bryant Quotes

I am the living death, a Memorial Day on wheels. I am your Yankee Doodle Dandy, your John Wayne come home, your Fourth of July firecracker exploding in the grave.

I speak for a nation which, more than any other, has fought and bled.

Here's to the red of it, There's not a thread of it, No, not a shred of it, In all the spread of it, From foot to head, But heroes bled for it, Faced steel and lead for it, Precious blood shed for it, Bathing in red.

A glorious death is his Who for his country falls.

Military glory—the attractive rainbow that rises in showers of blood.

Our nation owes a debt to its fallen heroes that we can never fully repay, but we can honor their sacrifice.

Heroes who shed their blood and lost their lives! You are now lying in the soil of a friendly country. Therefore rest in peace.

We must never forget or diminish the sacrifices of those who gave everything for this nation.

In times of war, it is often best to look to our history to see how past generations of Americans dealt with the loss of their countrymen in just causes.

It is heroic to prepare for war with a tyrant power. Patriots will always win the admiration of mankind for daring to meet the bloodshed of battle for their country's liberty. But the patriot who is willing to go to that sacrifice will be the first to condemn the aimless and secret shedding of blood in time of peace.

Going to war was the only unselfish thing I have ever done for humanity.

Why should we honour those that die upon the field of battle? A man may show as reckless a courage in entering into the abyss of himself.

The real heroes were my good buddies who died during the battles.

Through the centuries, over 1.2 million brave men and women have given their lives for our nation.

It is rather for us here dedicated to the great task remaining before us, that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion.

There is no French town in which the wounds inflicted on the battle-field are not bleeding.

For as long as this nation has known war, we have embraced the heroes it has produced.

Sacrifice is going to war for your country. Sacrifice is a brave young man being blown up by a landmine in Afghanistan.

It is a sacred duty to see that each of our dead comrades is escorted through the pearly gates by a large, a very large number of enemy dead. It is up to us now and here after to produce these escorts for the heroic slain.

When you go home, tell them of us and say, “For tomorrow these gave their today.”

Some made the ultimate sacrifice. The rest of us were lucky.

You can always hear the people who are willing to sacrifice somebody else's life. They're plenty loud and they talk all the time. You can find them in churches and schools and newspapers and legislatures and congress. That's their business. They sound wonderful. Death before dishonor. This ground sanctified by blood. These men who died so gloriously. They shall not have died in vain. Our noble dead.

It's always the old to lead us to the war It's always the young to fall Now look at all we've won with the sabre and the gun Tell me is it worth it all.

… from the dawn of history to the present time, men have paid the homage of their gratitude and admiration to the memory of those who nobly sacrifice their lives, that their fellow-men may live in safety and in honor.