Vera Lynn Quotes

Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few.

Let's drink to the spirit of gallantry and courage that made a strange Heaven out of unbelievable Hell, and let's drink to the hope that one day this country of ours, which we love so much, will find dignity and greatness and peace again.

The true legacy of 9-11 cannot be found among political leaders of the day, but in the citizen soldiers and public safety personnel who answered that day with courage and selflessness.

I thank God tonight for freedom - those who bought and paid for it with their lives in the past - those who will protect it in the present and defend it in the future.

On a normal day, we value heroism because it is uncommon. On Sept. 11, we valued heroism because it was everywhere.

Bad things do happen in the world, like war, natural disasters, disease. But out of those situations always arise stories of ordinary people doing extraordinary things.

They died to save their country, and they only saved the world.

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

No sir, anybody who went out and got into the front line trenches to fight for liberty was a goddamn fool and the guy who got him there was a liar.

Whatever miseries this war brings upon us, it is making us wiser, and, we trust, better. Wiser, for we are learning our weakness, our narrowness, our selfishness, our ignorance, in lessons of sorrow and shame. Better, because all that is noble in men and women is demanded by the time, and our people are rising to the standard the time calls for. For this is the question the hour is putting to each of us: Are you ready, if need be, to sacrifice all that you have and hope for in this world, that the generations to follow you may inherit a whole country whose natural condition shall be peace, and not a broken province which must live under the perpetual threat, if not in the constant presence, of war and all that war brings with it? If we are all ready for this sacrifice, battles may be lost, but the campaign and its grand object must be won.

Contrary to what most of Hollywood will tell you, the men and women of our armed forces are the best among us. Not only because of how they serve, but because they are able to find the best in each other... And they are able to encapsulate the best in all of us.

History knows no greater display of courage than that shown by the people of the Soviet Union.

The enduring realization that when a great challenge comes, the most ordinary people can show that they value something more than they value their own lives. When the last of the veterans had gone, and the sorrows and bitterness which the war created had at last worn away, this memory remained.

It is, I believe, the greatest generation any society has ever produced.

Men are never really willing to die except for the sake of freedom: therefore they do not believe in dying completely.

We should be inspired by people... who show that human beings can be kind, brave, generous, beautiful, strong-even in the most difficult circumstances.

Battle is the most magnificent competition in which a human being can indulge. It brings out all that is best; it removes all that is base. All men are afraid in battle. The coward is the one who lets his fear overcome his sense of duty. Duty is the essence of manhood.

In the weeks after 9/11, out of the pain and the fear there arose also grace and gratitude, eruptions of intense kindness that occurred everywhere, a sharp resolve to just be better, bigger, to shed the nonsense, rise to the occasion.

In war the heroes always outnumber the soldiers ten to one.

Then, in that hour of deliverance, my heart spoke. Does not such a country, and such defenders of their country, deserve a song?

There is no glory in war, yet from the blackness of its history, there emerge vivid colours of human character and courage. Those who risked their lives to help their friends.

We need to thank all of our troops, and particularly those for whom we can never express enough gratitude for they have given their lives so that all of us may be free and that our democracy can be a shining light for the rest of the world.

Yet would we die as some have done, beating a way for the rising sun.

There aren't many people who really put their life on the line for human freedom.

September 11 is one of our worst days but it brought out the best in us. It unified us as a country and showed our charitable instincts and reminded us of what we stood for and stand for.