To sin by silence when they should protest makes cowards of men.
--
Sometimes attributed to Lincoln since a 1950 speech of Douglas MacArthur citing him as its author, this is actually from a poem by Ella Wheeler Wilcox.Abraham Lincoln
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To sin by silence, when we should protest,
Makes cowards out of men.Ella Wheeler Wilcox
Each man must not think only of himself, but also of his buddy fighting beside him. We don't want yellow cowards in this Army. They should be killed off like rats. If not, they will go home after this war and breed more cowards. The brave men will breed more brave men. Kill off the Goddamned cowards and we will have a nation of brave men.
George S. Patton
The fear of being laughed at makes cowards of us all.
Mignon McLaughlin
The Non-Conformist Conscience makes cowards of us all.
Max Beerbohm
Much protest is naive; it expects quick, visible improvement and despairs and gives up when such improvement does not come. Protesters who hold out for longer have perhaps understood that success is not the proper goal. If protest depended on success, there would be little protest of any durability or significance. History simply affords too little evidence that anyone's individual protest is of any use. Protest that endures, I think, is moved by a hope far more modest than that of public success: namely, the hope of preserving qualities in one's own heart and spirit that would be destroyed by acquiescence.
Wendell Berry
Lincoln, Abraham
Lindbergh, Anne Morrow
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