Intrepidity Quotes
Samuel Langhorne Clemens, 1835-1910
Patton, though a great leader and fighting general, also was almost crazy and irrational at times. This quotation illustrates one of those periods. Somehow, most of the officers and enlisted men under his command were generally able to distinguish and live with him. In this case, no one tried to ferret out the cowards and kill them despite the Generals exhortation. Also, his—and other people’s notion that bravery is genetically inherited is scientifically incorrect.
Sometimes paraphrased as “the coward dies a thousand deaths, but the brave man dies but once.”
This has been attributed to Mussolini, most recently when this quote was tweeted by Donald Trump who was accused of repeating the words of the fascist dictator. This phrase was first used as a slogan by Italian solders in 1918 at the Battle of the Piave River during World War I. It was also written on the walls of many homes in the area to encourage each other during the battle.
In general, Jefferson thought Blacks at that stage of their development inferior to whites but as this quotation shows he also thought them superior in certain traits. He also stated that their memories were superior to that of whites, but this observation we know now is not, like any of the others, a racial characteristic but is common in all oral cultures where human memory is the only way of preserving history, literature, procedures and much culture.
