Good Soldier Quotes & Sayings

Every good soldier knew when to hide. — Anonymous

You know a constellation of imperishable values. Live by the mighty truth and power of God. Live above the sludge of a sick society. Live among dispirited humans as the vanguard of peace and good news. Remember, our Commander in Chief has no use for tin soldiers. — Carl F. H. Henry

A good soldier, like a good horse, cannot be of a bad color. — Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

But I understood Bear Otto's desire to become a noble man, a man like Billy Ansel, and I respected that, naturally. I just wished the boy had more ways of imagining the thing than by becoming a good soldier. But that's boys, I guess. — Russell Banks

The good soldier did as he was told, and if he had any sense at all volunteered for nothing, especially promotion. — Iain M. Banks

The first quality of a soldier is constancy in enduring fatigue and hardship. Courage is only the second. Poverty privation and want are the school of the good soldier. — Napoleon Bonaparte

We've got to have mind-collecting weeks in our zendos where your mind tries to fly off like a Tinker Toy and like a good soldier you put it back together with your eyes closed except of course the whole thing is wrong. — Jack Kerouac

I mean, Emily Harris was his wife. And she seemed to resent his leadership, but on the other hand, she felt like a good soldier, that he had to be the leader. — Patty Hearst

This is what opportunity brings with it. It's the self-determination of man. Every man in the course of his life eternal life undergoes countless changes and has to appear once in this worlds as a thief in certain periods of his activity. — Jaroslav Hasek

Kinkade sketched the occasional nude woman, and was generous about passing the sketches around to the men and cheerful about accepting criticisms and suggestions, which he seldom incorporated, as he had his own vision. He signed them O.McCaucus-Bigg
A new soldier was always puzzled by this, given that this wasn't Kinkade's name.
"O.McCaucus-Bigg?"
"Braggart, are you?" Kinkade would roar. "Not as big as mine,laddie!"
A good joke, suitable for thirteen-year-old boys and bored sergeants and subalterns. — Julie Anne Long

The good soldier swears to kill. Fire the cannon, mount the barricade, lock and load. Smell your brother's blood on your shirt. Wipe your sister's brains off your face. Die, if you have to, so they'll live. Kill to keep your people alive, live to kill some more. — Laurie Halse Anderson

At the bar on the Favoritenstrasse, Julius the policeman talked to us about dignity, evolution, the great Darwin and the great Nietzsche. I translated so that my good friend Ulises could understand what he was saying, although I didn't understand any of it. The prayer of the bones, said Julius. The yearning for health. The virtue of danger. The tenacity of the forgotten. Bravo, said my good friend Ulises. Bravo, said everyone else. The limits of memory. The wisdom of plants. The eye of parasites. The agility of the earth. The merit of the soldier. The cunning of the giant. The hole of the will. Magnificent, said my good friend Ulises in German. Extraordinary. — Roberto Bolano

TP53 seems to encode the greater good, like a suicide pill in the mouth of a soldier that dissolves only when it detects evidence that he is about to mutiny. — Matt Ridley

If the rules of a language are followed, words usually make sense. But these very rules can stir the impulse to rebel. We're obliged to keep trying to convey meaning through correct sentences. After a while, the good-soldier rigidity of polished prose can begin to seem dull, and it gets harder to resist the temptation of nonsense. — Joanna Scott

Within the soul of each Vietnam veteran there is probably something that says "Bad war, good soldier." Only now are Americans beginning to separate the war from the warrior. — Max Cleland

But even as the fear racks my body, it soothes me, comforts me. Soldiers who get washed away in a rush of adrenaline don't survive. In war, fear is the woman your mother warned you about. You knew she was no good for you, but you couldn't shake her. You had to find a way to get along, because she wasn't going anywhere. — Hiroshi Sakurazaka

Melanie's father had been an Army colonel who instilled in her a sense of duty as well as a sense of individuality. She grew up reading biographies of great men and women, mostly men and women in the military and government, and she recognized through her readings that no one rose to exceptional greatness exclusively by being "a good soldier." No, those few men and women who went against the establishment from time to time, only when necessary, were what ultimately made America great. — Tom Clancy

War is killing the individual in it unless he has learned livingness - if he had it he wouldn't be a good soldier. — Georgia O'Keeffe

The truth is, Rosemary, that you are capable of anything. Good or bad. You always have been, and you always will be. Given the right push, you, too, could do horrible things. That darkness exists within all of us. You think every soldier who picked up a cutter gun was a bad person? No. She was just doing what the soldier next to her was doing, who was doing what the soldier next to her was doing, and so on and so on. And I bet most of them - not all, but most - who made it through the war spent a long time after trying to understand what they'd done. Wondering how they ever could have done it in the first place. Wondering when killing became so comfortable. — Becky Chambers

There are obvious psychological stresses on a person in a group, but there may be even greater stresses on a person in isolation. Most higher primates, including humans, are intensely social, and there are few examples of individuals surviving outside of a group. A modern soldier returning from combat goes from the kind of close-knit situation that humans evolved for into a society where most people work outside the home, children are educated by strangers, families are isolated from wider communities, personal gain almost completely eclipses collective good, and people sleep alone or with a partner. Even if he or she is in a family, that is not the same as belonging to a large, self-sufficient group that shares and experiences almost everything collectively. Whatever the technological advances of modern society - and they're nearly miraculous - the individual lifestyles that those technologies spawn may be deeply brutalizing to the human spirit. — Jonathan Franzen

I am no king, and I am no lord,
And I am no soldier at-arms," said he.
"I'm none but a harper, and a very poor harper,
That am come hither to wed with ye."
"If you were a lord, you should be my lord,
And the same if you were a thief," said she.
"And if you are a harper, you shall be my harper,
For it makes no matter to me, to me,
For it makes no matter to me."
"But what if it prove that I am no harper?
That I lied for your love most monstrously?"
"Why, then I'll teach you to play and sing,
For I dearly love a good harp," said she. — Peter S. Beagle

It is impossible to give a soldier a good education without making him a deserter. His natural foe is the government that drills him. — Henry David Thoreau

Truth is, I just shrug and soldier on. As kind as I am, as well-meaning and helpful as I try to be, I have no feelings finally, for good or ill. In the depths of my being, no matter what happens, I am left cold, impenetrable to remorse, to grief, to happiness, though I can pretend well enough even to the point of fooling myself. I am trying to say I am finally, terribly, unfeeling. My soul resides in a still, deep, beautiful, emotionless, calm cold pond of silence. — E.L. Doctorow

I try to be a good cop. I try to be a good little soldier and follow orders up to a point. But in the end I'm not really a cop, or a soldier. I am a legally sanctioned murderer. I am the Executioner. — Laurell K. Hamilton

His mood is one of strenuous weariness; he does his duty as a good soldier, waiting for the sound of the trumpet which shall sound the retreat; he has not that cheerful confidence which led Socrates through a life no less noble, to a death which was to bring him into the company of gods he had worshipped and men whom he had revered. — Marcus Aurelius

You therefore must endure hardship as a good soldier of Jesus Christ. — Anonymous

We got us a good sergeant, is what I'm saying.' Maybe nodded, and glanced back at Crump. 'You listening, soldier? Don't mess it up.' The tall, long-faced man with the strangely wide-spaced eyes blinked confusedly. 'They stepped on my cussers,' he said. 'Now I ain't got any more.' 'Can you use that sword on your belt, sapper?' 'What? This? No, why would I want to do that? We're just marching.' Lagging behind, breath coming in harsh gasps, Limp said, 'Crump had a bag of munitions. Stuck his brain in there, too. For, uh, safekeeping. It all went up, throwing Nah'ruk everywhere. He's just an empty skull now, Maybe.' 'So he can't fight? What about using a crossbow?' 'Never seen him try one of those. But fight? Crump fights, don't worry about that.' 'Well, with what, then? That stupid bush knife?' 'He uses his hands, Maybe.' 'Well, that's just great then.' 'We're just marching,' said Crump again, and then he laughed. — Steven Erikson

Brave is good - especially when you are a soldier. — Olivier Martinez

A modern soldier returning from combat - or a survivor of Sarajevo - goes from the kind of close-knit group that humans evolved for, back into a society where most people work outside the home, children are educated by strangers, families are isolated from wider communities, and personal gain almost completely eclipses collective good. — Sebastian Junger

There are one or two very good women military historians who use imagination, great study and research; they can put themselves in the boots of the soldier. — Antony Beevor

What has to happen to us before we understand that we have to take good care of everything we have, of every tree in our boundless forests, every little stream that isn't even marked on the maps, every village with only five households, every soldier drafted into the army, every man in the street toiling under his dreary daily burden? What will it take to change us? — Sergei Lukyanenko

That's what's wrong with the country. There are too many 'good soldiers' accepting too many bad decisions. — Shirley Chisholm

Therefore, we read the Bible selectively. We pick a text here and there to fit our felt needs. This is like a doctor who forgets how to write prescriptions for the best antibiotics because every- body seems healthy, and he has spent the last decades tweaking good health with hip-hop exercise videos, unaware that pestilence is at the door. It's like the soldier who forgets how to use his weapons because the times seem peaceful, and he has spent the last decades doing relief work and teaching the children how to play games. — John Piper

If I have got to be a soldier, I must be a good one, anything else is unthinkable. — Wilfred Owen

On every pack leaned an M16, except Lori's. Her son was playing soldier with it in the bleachers. There was no clip in it, which was a good thing. — Rick Bragg

To have good soldiers, a nation must always be at war. — Napoleon Bonaparte

I disappear for twenty minutes into Ford Maddox Ford's The Good Soldier while John does the dishes, fighting past my initial irritation all the class nonsense and how no one will say anything of significance because it's simply not done to be explicit. Like in James or Wharton. Those novels where you're screaming at characters to go ahead already and blurt it out, save us a hundred pages of prevarication. — Adam Haslett

The colored man has been accustomed all his life to lean on the white man, and if a good officer is placed over him, he will learn readily and make a good soldier. — Ulysses S. Grant

Gold will not always get you good soldiers, but good soldiers can get you gold. — Niccolo Machiavelli

If slaves will make good soldiers, then our whole theory of slavery is wrong. — Howell Cobb

The sinews of war are not gold, but good soldiers; for gold alone will not procure good soldiers, but good soldiers will always procure gold. — Niccolo Machiavelli

Not very good with death? Father was a military man, and military men lived with death; lived for death; lived on death. To a professional soldier, oddly enough, death was life. — Alan Bradley

Thomas looked around and tried not to let his duty turn him bitter. These were good men, and he would not leave them behind. He had chosen this, an unselfish life. — Jessica Fortunato

I don't think I could be a foot soldier. I don't know if I could take orders too good. I'm a little lazy. — Benicio Del Toro

Good soldiers, bad officers; however don't forget that without them we would not have any Civilization. — Erwin Rommel

In fact, it was part of the Tyrannian military tradition that a little discomfort on the part of the soldier was good for discipline. — Isaac Asimov

Jenni spared a moment to shake her head, before following after. "So you do it."

Max gave her a sidelong glance. "Some are born to coach, some are born to do. Some of us didn't have a good soldier and a benevolent nurse to back up our sparkling smile."

"I do not sparkle. You are to shoot me if I ever sparkle. — Shanda Sharlow

It isn't right to be obedient only when things go well; it is much harder to be a good, obedient soldier when things go badly and times are hard. Obedience and faith at such time is a virtue. — Wilhelm Keitel

Man is full of desires: he loves only those who can satisfy them all. "This man is a good mathematician," someone will say. But I have no concern for mathematics; he would take me for a proposition. "That one is a good soldier." He would take me for a besieged town. I need, that is to say, a decent man who can accommodate himself to all my desires in a general sort of way. — Blaise Pascal

A good soldier never leaves a man behind. — Sarge

Colleague, given that I'm detached to go hunting bandits, I'd be grateful for the continued loan of your horses until we return. A squadron of cavalry could make all the difference when we're chasing around the forests after shadows.'
Licinius gave him a jaundiced look. 'You've got sticky fingers, young man. Every soldier that comes into contact with your cohort seems to end up as part of it. Hamian archers, borrowed cavalrymen. I'll even wager you that the half-century of legionaries Dubnus borrowed from the Sixth will end up in your establishment. And yes, you can extend the loan if you think it'll do you any good, and you can keep that decurion you promoted to command them. — Anthony Riches

What job do you want to do?
And I see them all hanging up before me, like clothes on a rack, all the jobs, tinker, tailor, soldier, and you have to pick one and then you have to pretend for the rest of your life that that's what you are. So they aint no different really from accidents of birth. I didn't know that phrase then but I learnt it later. It's a good phrase ... — Graham Swift

He woke up alone. Lilah had rocked his world once, twice ... he leaned over the bed to county empty condom wrappers.. three times, and then she'd
Walked off before dawn.
That was usually his role. "My own fault," he told the mutt, who was sitting on his chest. "I was easy."
"Arf," the dog said in complete agreement, and licked Brady's chin.
"You're one to judge," Brady said in disgust. "If someone even thinks about petting you, you drop and expose your kibble and bits. No soldier worth his salt does that. "You're like a damn dog."
"Arf."
"Okay, good point," he said, shaking his head. "You are a dog. And so, apparently, am I. — Jill Shalvis

To secure the safety of the navigation of the Mississippi River I would slay millions. On that point I am not only insane, but mad ... I think I see one or two quick blows that will astonish the natives of the South and will convince them that, though to stand behind a big cottonwood and shoot at a passing boat is good sport and safe, it may still reach and kill their friends and families hundreds of miles off. For every bullet shot at a steamboat, I would shoot a thousand 30-pounder Parrots into even helpless towns on Red, Ouachita, Yazoo, or wherever a boat can float or soldier march. — William Tecumseh Sherman

It was an inflexible maxim of Roman discipline that good soldier should dread his own officers far more than the enemy — Edward Gibbon

Skipping the intermediary stages, it suffices to say that this synthesis, after being incarnated in the Church
and in Reason, culminates in the absolute State, founded by the soldier workers, where the spirit of the world will be finally reflected in the mutual recognition of each by all and in the universal reconciliation of everything that has ever existed under the sun. At this moment, "when the eyes of the spirit coincide with the eyes of the body," each individual consciousness will be nothing more than a mirror reflecting another mirror, itself reflected to infinity in infinitely recurring images. The City of God will coincide with the city of humanity; and universal history, sitting in judgment on the world, will pass its sentence by which good and evil will be justified. The State will play the part of Destiny and will proclaim its approval of every aspect of reality on
"the sacred day of the Presence. — Albert Camus

At 19, your brain hasn't finished wiring itself. So the first time you have a good friend die, most people don't go through that at 19. Soldiers do. They're facing life in this accelerated, compressed form, and a lot of times, they're not ready for it. — Sebastian Junger

It is a mistake to think that some of our impulses - say mother love or patriotism - are good, and others, like sex or the fighting instinct, are bad ... There are situations in which it is the duty of a married man to encourage his sexual impulse and of a soldier to encourage the fighting instinct. There are also occasions on which a mother's love for her own children or a man's love for his own country have to be suppressed or they will lead to unfairness towards other people's children or countries. — Timothy Keller

Soldier and civilian, they died in their tens of thousands because death had been concocted for them, morality hitched like a halter round the warhorse so that we could talk about 'target-rich environments' and 'collateral damage' - that most infantile of attempts to shake off the crime of killing - and report the victory parades, the tearing down of statues and the importance of peace.
Governments like it that way. They want their people to see war as a drama of opposites, good and evil, 'them' and 'us', victory or defeat. But war is primarily not about victory or defeat but about death and the infliction of death. It represents a total failure of the human spirit. — Robert Fisk

There are many good people who are denied the supreme blessing of children, and for these we have the respect and sympathy always due to those who, from no fault of their own, are denied any of the other great blessings of life. But the man or woman who deliberately foregoes these blessings, whether from viciousness, coldness, shallow-heartedness, self-indulgence, or mere failure to appreciate aright the difference between the all-important and the unimportant - why, such a creature merits contempt as hearty as any visited upon the soldier who runs away in battle, or upon the man who refuses to work for the support of those dependent upon him, and who though able-bodied is yet content to eat in idleness the bread which others provide. — Theodore Roosevelt

I was a good soldier in the British Army. I was born in a very, very poor family. And I enlisted to escape hunger. But my officers were Scottish and they loved me. The Scots are good, you know. — Idi Amin

No man was ever a good soldier but the man who goes into the battle determined to conquer, or not to come back from the battle field (cheers). No other principle makes a good soldier. — Daniel O'Connell

No, Captain Lombard, the matter rests there. It is understood by my client that your reputation is that of a good man in a tight place. I am empowered to hand you one hundred guineas in return for which you will travel to Sticklehaven, Devon. The nearest station is Oakbridge, you will be met there and motored to Sticklehaven where a motor launch will convey you to Soldier Island. There you will hold yourself at the disposal of my client. Lombard — Agatha Christie

It is our job as parents, to instill principles and values in our children. So that when they depart from you, those principles and values won't depart from them. Mallory Bullard, a street soldier from the old school. — Drexel Deal

Killing Japanese didn't bother me at that time. It was getting the war over with that bothered me. So I wasn't worried particularly about how many people we killed in getting the job done ... . All war is immoral, and if you let it bother you, you're not a good soldier. — Ronald Schaffer

While we are zealously performing the duties of good citizens and soldiers, we certainly ought not to be inattentive to the higher duties of religion. To the distinguished character of Patriot, it should be our highest glory to add the more distinguished character of Christian. — George Washington

I suppose you want me to give certificates to all the contestants? Little plastic trophies to every single athlete or soldier for participation? Should we all line up and shake hands and tell each other, Good game? No! — Rick Riordan

The gods command that there can be only one king. But I swear that I am no better than a common soldier today, and you are as good as kings. Each man here is part of me. So what's left for the king to say? Only two words, but they are the two that your hearts want to
hear. Victory.And home!" Then his command cracked like a whip. "All together - move! — Deepak Chopra

I'm brilliant as well as skilled," he said modestly. "It's a great burden, all of that on top of my angelic good looks. But I try to soldier on as best I can. — Jim Butcher

Forces of good and evil are massed and armed and opposed as rarely before in history. Freedom is pitted against slavery; lightness against the dark ... In the final choice, a soldier's pack is not so heavy a burden as a prisoner's chains. — Dwight D. Eisenhower

Sounds like the rival is a good soldier, Cono said. Like the Russians say, a bad soldier is one who doesn't try to become a general. — Victor Robert Lee

After my time working for the government as a soldier, I reacquainted myself with the possibilities of government as a force for good beyond its awesome capacity as a force in war and security. — Wes Moore

I'm sorry," he said at last.
"Don't apologize. For all we know, there is no firebird."
"You don't believe that."
"No, but maybe we weren't meant to find it."
"You don't believe that either." He sighed. "So much for the good soldier."
I winced. "I shouldn't have said that."
"You once put goose droppings in my shoes, Alina. A bad mood I can handle. — Leigh Bardugo

It is essential to persuade the soldier that those he is being urged to massacre are bandits who do not deserve to live; before killing other good, decent fellows like himself, his gun would fall from his hands. — Andre Gide

No amount of pay ever made a good soldier, a good teacher, a good artist, or a good workman. — John Ruskin

And while thou
livest, dear Kate, take a fellow of plain and
uncoined constancy; for he perforce must do thee
right, because he hath not the gift to woo in other
places: for these fellows of infinite tongue, that
can rhyme themselves into ladies' favours, they do
always reason themselves out again. What! a
speaker is but a prater; a rhyme is but a ballad. A
good leg will fall; a straight back will stoop; a
black beard will turn white; a curled pate will grow
bald; a fair face will wither; a full eye will wax
hollow: but a good heart, Kate, is the sun and the
moon; or, rather, the sun, and not the moon; for it
shines bright and never changes, but keeps his
course truly. If thou would have such a one, take
me; and take me, take a soldier; take a soldier,
take a king. And what sayest thou then to my love?
speak, my fair, and fairly, I pray thee — William Shakespeare

This I said in the Irish way, about which there is allowed to be something very engaging. It's a remarkable thing, and a testimony to the love with which our nation is regarded, that this address scarce ever fails in a handsome fellow. I cannot tell how often I have seen a private soldier escape the horse, or a beggar wheedle out a good alms, by a touch of the brogue. — Robert Louis Stevenson

Got any good ideas, soldier?" "Lots of them. Somebody gunned Geiger. Somebody got gunned by Geiger, who ran away. Or it was two other fellows. Or Geiger was running a cult and made blood sacrifices in front of that totem pole. Or he had chicken for dinner and liked to kill his chickens in the front parlor. — Raymond Chandler

Every good soldier wants to live in an organized environment, secure in the knowledge that he or she will not be threatened or harassed by others, confident that his or her efforts will be recognized, and aware that the nonproductive soldier will be invited to leave. In such an environment, soldiers will be proud of their units and will demonstrate that pride with their performance and behavior. — William A. Connelly

Damn it all, it's the first duty of a soldier - it's the first duty of all Englishmen - to be able to tell a good lie in answer to a charge. — Ford Madox Ford

Keep unscathed the good name; keep out of peril the honor without which even your battered old soldier who is hobbling into his grave on half-pay and a wooden leg would not change with Achilles. — Edward Bulwer-Lytton, 1st Baron Lytton

Ford Maddox Ford's 'The Good Soldier' is my favourite novel. I first read it in the 1950s and have read it about 20 times since. It's possibly the best-constructed book in the English language. — Ruth Rendell

I'm obsessed with trying to recount events as accurately and honestly as possible, but in practice the only thing I'm really any good at is telling you how I feel. — Jason Christopher Hartley

Being a soldier isn't easy, but being a soldier's wife is more difficult still. It's a team effort if you are to succeed; both must believe in the profession and believe that it will always take care of you. You overlook the bad--the loneliness, the cramped quarters, the mediocre hospitals, and the lousy pay--because you believe in the greater good of what you are doing. — David Morehouse

He prizes me as a soldier would a good weapon, and that is all. [ ... ] Can I receive from him the bridal ring, endure all the forms of love [ ... ] and know that the spirit was quite absent? Can I bear the consciousness that every endearment he bestows is a sacrifice made on principle? No: such a martyrdom would be monstrous. I will never undergo it. — Charlotte Bronte

Scared. That's good. A fine soldier is always scared. Makes you normal. It's how you respond to it that makes or breaks you. — James Dashner

He's a good, brave and honourable soldier. — Norman Lamont

In order to be a good soldier it is necessary to know how to dance. — Plato

I don't know if I believed in the war or not, Ari. I don't think I did. I think about it a lot. But I signed up. And I don't know what I felt about this country. I do know that the only country I had were the men that fought side by side. They were my country, Ari. Them. Louie and Beckett and Garcia and Al and Gio - they were my country. I'm not proud of everything I did in that war. I wasn't always a good soldier. I wasn't always a good man. War did something to us. To me. To all of us. But the men we left behind. Those are the ones who are in my dreams. — Benjamin Alire Saenz

A good soldier has his heart and soul in it. When he receives an order, he gets a hard on, and when he drives his lance through his enemy's guts, he comes. — Bertolt Brecht

She was a soldier, a warrior in her way as much as I. This could have happened two hundred times these past twenty years. She knew it, and so did I. It was a good day to die. — Robert Jordan

Self-denial and self-discipline, however, will be recognized as the outstanding qualities of a good soldier. — William Lyon Mackenzie King

Revolutions are good times for soldiers of talent and courage. — Napoleon Bonaparte

Good God, what did they all see in him? for I swear there was all there was of him, inside and out; though they said he was a good soldier. Yet, Leonora adored him with a passion that was like an agony, and hated him with an agony that was as bitter as the sea. How could he arouse anything like a sentiment, in anybody? — Ford Madox Ford

And Oliver North was really a good soldier, up to the last moment, shoving memos into the shredder and defending the policy to the end. — Bobby Ray Inman

Every morning is good news, every child that is born is good news, every just man is good news, every singer is good news, because every singer is one less soldier. — Facundo Cabral

He wasn't like some of the hippies in England, where the qualification to rebel is planted by the guilt raised from being a spoilt child with a good education. He was a real hippy born from being forced to kill for his army until he was twenty one. He had long hair because the army made him shave his head. The army made him shave every day too. Now he had a beard. His face for a long time was not his own. When this guy said he was all about peace he wasn't talking about peace because his mum never got him the horse he wanted for his eighteenth birthday, he was talking about peace because he'd seen war. He talked about love because he knew hate: hate for those above him, hate for those he had served with, hate for enemies not born his but who became so and, lastly, hate for himself for how his mind had been controlled. — Craig Stone

if it comes to a choice between being a good soldier and a good human being -- try to be a good human being". — Anton Myrer

So for, you know, for a good 20 years now I've been involved with veterans and soldiers and in support of them no matter what they're doing. — Gary Sinise

He who neither drinks, nor smokes, nor dances, he who preaches & even occasionally practice piety, temperance and celibacy, is generally a saint, or a mahatma or more likely a humbug but he certainly won't make a leader or for that matter a good soldier — Sam Manekshaw