Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield Quotes

A man who is dishonored is considered dead.

In Washington it is an honor to be disgraced.... You have to have been somebody to fall.

The soldier may die; the deserter must die.

You think death is any better an excuse for desertion than any other?

I look upon the vulgar observation, 'That the devil often deserts his friends, and leaves them in the lurch,' to be a great abuse on that gentleman's character. Perhaps he may sometimes desert those who are only his cup acquaintance; or who, at most, are but half his; but he generally stands by those who are thoroughly his servants, and helps them off in all extremities, till their bargain expires.

Virtue is the first title of nobility.

It would be very unjust to say that you deserted me, but that I was deserted, and sometimes terribly so, is true.

The soldier is the Army. No army is better than its soldiers. The Soldier is also a citizen. In fact, the highest obligation and privilege of citizenship is that of bearing arms for one’s country

And with that answer, he left me. I would much rather he had knocked me down.

Friends fly away when the cask has been drained to the dregs.

Nobody loves you when you're down and out.

Benedict Arnold was a war hero, wounded in battle--before he turned against his country. Hitler was likewise a decorated and wounded veteran of the First World War. Being a war hero is not a lifetime...exempt[ion]...from responsibility for what you do thereafter.

Certain trifling flaws sit as disgracefully on a character of elegance as a ragged button on a court dress.

It is a greater advantage to be honestly educated than honorably born.

A well-born man is fortunate, but so is the man about whom people no longer ask, 'is he well-born?'

We may daily discover crowds acquire sufficient wealth to buy gentility, but very few that possess the virtues which ennoble human nature, and (in the best sense of the word) constitute a gentleman.

Indifference must be a crime in us, to be ranked but one degree below treachery; for deserting the commonwealth is next to betraying it.

When the going gets tough, everyone leaves.

The devil helps his servants for a season; but when they get into a pinch; he leaves them in the lurch.

Personally, I hold that a man, who deliberately and intelligently takes a pledge and then breaks it, forfeits his manhood.

You gave him an opportunity of showing greatness of character and he did not seize it. He will never forgive you for that.

It is soldiers who pay most of the human cost. In war it is extraordinary how it all comes down to the character of one man.

I fluffed off the guy who kept requesting tunes all night, then found out he was the King's son.

...One time you take a hundred thousand dollars and let a vampire go, the whole world turns on you like you're some kind of bad guy.

There are two modes of establishing our reputation; to be praised by honest men, and to be abused by rogues.