Elihu Root Quotes

It goes without saying that when survival is threatened, struggles erupt between peoples, and unfortunate wars between nations result.

War had always seemed to me to be a purely human behavior. Accounts of warlike behavior date back to the very first written records of human history; it seemed to be an almost universal characteristic of human groups.

War makes strange giant creatures out of us little routine men who inhabit the earth.

I think its man's nature to go to war and fight.

All war represents a failure of diplomacy.

It is far easier to make war than peace.

The history of mankind is a history of war.

War's a profanity because, let's face it, you've got two opposing sides trying to settle their differences by killing as many of each other as they can.

Either war is obsolete, or men are.

War is regarded as nothing but the continuation of state policy with other means.

War is the greatest failure of mankind.

The normal state of mankind is war and peace is an aberration.

War is one of the constants of history, and it has not diminished with civilization or democracy. In the last 3,421 years of recorded history only 268 have seen no war.

That was a declaration of war

Those who make war unjustly shall perish

The belief that war is inevitable makes of war a self-fulfilling prophecy.

War is always an option. Peace is not.

There's in people simply an urge to destroy, an urge to kill, to murder and rage, and until all mankind, without exception, undergoes a great change, wars will be waged, everything that has been built up, cultivated, and grown will be destroyed and disfigured, after which mankind will have to begin all over again

War seems to be one of the most salutary phenomena for the culture of human nature; and it is not without regret that I see it disappearing more and more from the scene.

Even philosophers will praise war as ennobling mankind, forgetting the Greek who said: 'War is bad in that it begets more evil than it kills.'

The main goal of the future is to stop violence. The world is addicted to it.

What is our vision on this earth - war to the end of all generations and life by the sword?

War is the science of destruction.

Unless a nation's life faces peril, war is murder.

I was never convinced that war was the best system to bring democracy to the country.