A Quote by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

If we could read the secret history of our enemies.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Quote Topics

Could Enemies History Our Read Secret

Quote Author

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
American - Poet
February 27, 1807 - March 24, 1882

If we could read the secret history of our enemies we should find in each man's life sorrow and suffering enough to disarm all hostility.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Perhaps Communists had wormed their way so deeply into our government on both the working and planning levels that they were able to exercise an inordinate degree of power in shaping the course of America in the dangerous postwar era. I could not help wondering and worrying whether we were faced with open enemies across the conference table and hidden enemies who sat with us in our most secret councils.

Mark W. Clark

If we could read the past histories of all our enemies we would disregard all hostility for them.

Napoleon Bonaparte

It is a cruel thought, that, when we feel ourselves standing on the firmest ground in every respect, the cursed arts of our secret enemies, combining with other causes, should effect, by depreciating our money, what the open arms of a powerful enemy could not.

Thomas Jefferson

Those of us who read carried around with us like martyrs a secret knowledge, a secret joy, and a secret hope: There is a life worth living where history is still taking place; there are ideas worth dying for, and circumstances where courage is still prized.

Annie Dillard

The Bible says we need to love our enemies, bless our enemies. It does not say we should assume our enemies' priorities.

David McGee

The authentic rebel knows that the silencing of all his adversaries is the last thing on earth he wishes: their extermination would deprive him and whoever else remains alive from the uniqueness, the originality, and the capacity for insight that these enemies being human also have and could share with him. If we wish the death of our enemies, we cannot talk about the community of man. In the losing of the chance for dialogue with our enemies, we are the poorer.

Rollo May

Read. Read. Read. Read. Read great books. Read poetry, history, biography. Read the novels that have stood the test of time. And read closely.

David McCullough

Dictators must have enemies. They must have internal enemies to justify their secret police and external enemies to justify their military forces.

Richard Perle

Let us first fulfill Christ's injunction ourselves and only then venture to expect it of our children. Otherwise we are not fathers, but enemies of our children, and they are not our children, but our enemies, and we have made them our enemies ourselves.

Fyodor Dostoevsky

We need to actually teach kids that books aren't like broccoli. You don't have to eat every bit on your plate. It's like secret adult's business. It's the secret we never, ever tell our children. No adult ever read a book because it's good for us. We read because it is fun.

Jackie French

It's no secret that me and New York got history. It's no secret. This is no secret. It's already known.

Paul Pierce

Read. Read every chance you get. Read to keep growing. Read history. Read poetry. Read for pure enjoyment. Read a book called Life on a Little Known Planet. It's about insects. It will make you feel better.

David McCullough

I had to read up on the Freemasons, about secret societies, and dip my toe into art history.

Ashley Zukerman

We don't seek to destroy our enemies. After all, Jesus taught that our love must extend even to enemies. It's a remarkable teaching. Not to destroy enemies, but to convert hearts, to win people over to the cause of justice.