# Winston Churchill's greatest quotes (the real ones)

Churchill's most famous lines with the speech or book and the date, checked against Wikiquote and the International Churchill Society. Left out on purpose: «If you're going through hell, keep going» and «Success is not final, failure is not fatal», which he never said.

- 29 votes · 15 items
- Mar 20, 2024 · Lucy Sutcliffe
- https://even.best/en/l/346/winston-churchill-s-greatest-quotes-the-real-ones

## Top 15

1. **Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few.** (2 · ▲4 ▼2) — House of Commons, 20 August 1940, about the RAF pilots in the Battle of Britain.
2. **We shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the…** (2 · ▲2 ▼0) — «We shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender.» House of Commons, 4 June 1940, after the evacuation of Dunkirk.
3. **I have nothing to offer but blood, toil, tears and sweat.** (2 · ▲2 ▼0) — His first speech as Prime Minister, House of Commons, 13 May 1940.
4. **Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning.** (2 · ▲2 ▼0) — Speech at the Lord Mayor's Luncheon, Mansion House, 10 November 1942, after El Alamein.
5. **Democracy is the worst form of Government except for all those other forms that have been tried from time to time.** (2 · ▲2 ▼0) — House of Commons, 11 November 1947; he introduced it with «it has been said that…».
6. **The price of greatness is responsibility.** (2 · ▲2 ▼0) — Speech at Harvard University, 6 September 1943.
7. **To jaw-jaw is always better than to war-war.** (2 · ▲2 ▼0) — Remark at a White House lunch, 26 June 1954.
8. **From Stettin in the Baltic to Trieste in the Adriatic, an iron curtain has descended across the Continent.** (1 · ▲2 ▼1) — The «Sinews of Peace» speech at Westminster College, Fulton, Missouri, 5 March 1946.
9. **I cannot forecast to you the action of Russia. It is a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma.** (1 · ▲2 ▼1) — BBC radio broadcast, 1 October 1939.
10. **This was their finest hour.** (1 · ▲1 ▼0) — House of Commons, 18 June 1940: «if the British Empire and its Commonwealth last for a thousand years, men will still say, This was their finest hour».
11. **Nothing in life is so exhilarating as to be shot at without result.** (1 · ▲1 ▼0) — The Story of the Malakand Field Force (1898), his first book, about the North-West Frontier.
12. **Give us the tools, and we will finish the job.** (1 · ▲1 ▼0) — Radio broadcast addressed to President Roosevelt, 9 February 1941.
13. **We shape our buildings; thereafter they shape us.** (1 · ▲1 ▼0) — House of Commons, 28 October 1943, on rebuilding the bombed Commons chamber as it was.
14. **For my part, I consider that it will be found much better by all parties to leave the past to history, especially as…** (1 · ▲1 ▼0) — «For my part, I consider that it will be found much better by all parties to leave the past to history, especially as I propose to write that history myself.» House of Commons, 23 January 1948; the origin of the popular «History will be kind to me, for I intend to write it».
15. **Never give in, never give in, never, never, never, never—in nothing, great or small, large or petty—never give in…** (0 · ▲0 ▼0) — «Never give in, never give in, never, never, never, never—in nothing, great or small, large or petty—never give in except to convictions of honour and good sense.» Speech at Harrow School, 29 October 1941.

How is this ranking ordered? By people's votes: each ▲ adds a point and each ▼ takes one away. Anyone can vote and add what is missing.