Quotes about defeat

We may encounter many defeats but we must not be defeated.

— Maya Angelou

Defeat is a school in which truth always grows strong.

— Henry Ward Beecher

It is defeat that turns bone to flint; it is defeat that turns gristle to muscle; it is defeat that makes men invincible.

— Henry Ward Beecher

There are important cases in which the difference between half a heart and a whole heart makes just the difference between signal defeat and a splendid victory.

— A. H. K. Boyd

You can learn a line from a win and a book from a defeat.

— Paul Brown

I give the fight up: let there be an end, a privacy, an obscure nook for me. I want to be forgotten even by God.

— Robert Browning

The problems of victory are more agreeable than those of defeat, but they are no less difficult.

— Winston Churchill

My lowest days as a Christian [and There Were Low Ones--Seven Months Worth Of Them In Prison, To Be Exact] have been more fulfilling and rewarding than all the days of glory in the White House.

— Charles Caleb Colton

When the frustration of my helplessness seemed greatest, I discovered God's grace was more than sufficient. And after my imprisonment, I could look back and see how God used my powerlessness for His purpose. What He has chosen for my most significant witness was not my triumphs or victories, but my defeat.

— Charles Caleb Colton

Defeat never comes to any man until he admits it.

— Josephus Daniels

Most human organizations that fall short of their goals do so not because of stupidity or faulty doctrines, but because of internal decay and rigidification. They grow stiff in the joints. They get in a rut. They go to seed.

— James A. Garfield

A man can be destroyed but not defeated.

— Ernest Hemingway

I think everyone should experience defeat at least once during their career. You learn a lot from it.

— Lou Holtz

The man who wins may have been counted out several times but he didn't hear the referee.

— H. E. Jansen

Making a comeback is one of the most difficult things to do with dignity.

— Greg Lake

I've learned that something constructive comes from every defeat.

— Tom Landry

We are not retreating - we are advancing in another direction.

— Douglas Macarthur

There are some defeats more triumphant than victories.

— Michel Eyquem De Montaigne

Those who are prepared to die for any cause are seldom defeated.

— Jawaharlal Nehru

Defeat doesn't finish a man -- quit does. A man is not finished when he's defeated. He's finished when he quits.

— Richard M. Nixon

To walk through the ruined cities of Germany is to feel an actual doubt about the continuity of civilization.

— George Orwell

Believe you are defeated, believe it long enough, and it is likely to become a fact.

— Norman Vincent Peale

The injustice of defeat lies in the fact that its most innocent victims are made to look like heartless accomplices. It is impossible to see behind defeat, the sacrifices, the austere performance of duty, the self-discipline and the vigilance that are there -- those things the god of battle does not take account of.

— Antoine De Saint-Exupery

Commonly, people believe that defeat is characterized by a general bustle and a feverish rush. Bustle and rush are the signs of victory, not of defeat. Victory is a thing of action. It is a house in the act of being built. Every participant in victory sweats and puffs, carrying the stones for the building of the house. But defeat is a thing of weariness, of incoherence, of boredom. And above all of futility.

— Antoine De Saint-Exupery

A man is not defeated by his opponents but by himself.

— Jan Christian Smuts

The mark of a great player is in his ability to come back. The great champions have all come back from defeat.

— Sam Snead

Never confuse a single defeat with a final defeat.

— Source Unknown

Who asks whether the enemy were defeated by strategy or valor?

— Virgil

Defeat is not the worst of failures. Not to have tried is the true failure.

— George E. Woodberry

For by superior energies; more strict affiance in each other; faith more firm in their unhallowed principles, the bad have fairly earned a victory over the weak, the vacillating, inconsistent good.

— William Wordsworth