Once you are so unfortunate as to be drawn into a war, no price is too great to pay for an early and victorious peace.

All the greatest economists, John Stuart Mill at their head, have always spoken of the evils of borrowing for the purposes of war, and have pointed out that as far as possible posterity should be relieved and the cost of what is consumed in the war be met at the time. That is a counsel of perfection, but nobody has ever come nearer to it than the late Chancellor of the Exchequer [Sir Kingsley Wood].

You have to run risks. There are no certainties in war. There is a precipice on either side of you - a precipice of caution and a precipice of over-daring.

Never, never, never believe any war will be smooth and easy, or that anyone who embarks on the strange voyage can measure the tides and hurricanes he will encounter. The statesman who yields to war fever must realize that once the signal is given, he is no longer the master of policy but the slave of unforeseeable and uncontrollable events.

But who in war will not have his laugh amid the skulls?

I would rather have a peace-keeping hypocrisy than straightforward, brazen vice, taking the form of unlimited war.