#Preparedness Quotes

“Better three hours too soon than a minute too late.”

“But since the affairs of men rests still incertain,Let's reason with the worst that may befall.”

“All things are ready, if our mind be so.”

“So you see that the process of education, taken in a large way, may be described as nothing but the process of acquiring ideas or conceptions, the best educated mind being the mind which has the largest stock of them, ready to meet the largest possible variety of the emergencies of life. The lack of education means only the failure to have acquired them, and the consequent liability to be 'floored' and 'rattled' in the vicissitudes of experience.”

“Opportunities come infrequently. When it rains gold, put out the bucket, not the thimble.”

“We are the only nation in the world that waits till we get into a war before we start getting ready for it.”

“I believe the chance of any event causing Berkshire to experience financial problems is essentially zero. We will always be prepared for the thousand-year flood; in fact, if it occurswe will be selling life jackets to the unprepared.”

“It is Mortifying to suppose it possible that a people able and zealous to contend with the Enemy should be reduced to fold their Arms for want of the means of defence; yet no resources that we know of, ensure us against this event.”

“Every day that goes by, I mean, if you don't react to Pearl Harbor for a week or two weeks or three weeks, you're behind in the war that you otherwise would have fought.”

“Always carry a flagon of whiskey in case of snakebite, and furthermore always carry a small snake.”

“Whatever enables us to go to war, secures our peace”

“Let the eye of vigilance never be closed.”

“Hoping they bury me with ammunition, weed, and shells. Just in case.”

“Unjust war is to be abhorred; but woe to the nation that does not make ready to hold its own in time of need against all who would harm it! And woe thrice over to the nation in which the average man loses the fighting edge, loses the power to serve as a soldier if the day of need should arise!”

“It may be that at some time in the dim future of the race the need for war will vanish: but that time is yet ages distant. As yet no nation can hold its place in the world, or can do any work really worth doing, unless it stands ready to guard its right with an armed hand.”

“Let us speak courteously, deal fairly, and keep ourselves armed and ready.”

“One loves to possess arms, though they hope never to have occasion for them.”

“I abhor unjust war. I abhor injustice and bullying by the strong at the expense of the weak, whether among nations or individuals. I abhor violence and bloodshed. I believe that war should never be resorted to when, or so long as, it is honorably possible to avoid it. I respect all men and women who from high motives and with sanity and self-respect do all they can to avert war. I advocate preparation for war in order to avert war; and I should never advocate war unless it were the only alternative to dishonor.”

“If you're looking for friends when you need them...it's too late.”

“I base my calculation on the expectation that luck will be against me.”

“A commander in chief ought to say to himself several times a day: If the enemy should appear on my front, on my right, on my left, what would I do? And if the question finds him uncertain, he is not well placed, he is not as he should be, and he should remedy it.”

“Among other causes of misfortune which your not being armed brings upon you, it makes you despised.”

“A leader has the right to be beaten, but never the right to be surprised.”

“Hoping for the best, prepared for the worst, and unsurprised by anything in between.”

“Never lose sight of this maxim, that you should establish your cantonments at the most distant and best protected point from the enemy, especially where a surprise is possible. By this means you will have time to unite all your forces before he can attack you.”

“Everyone has a plan 'till they get punched in the mouth.”

“A good many observers have remarked that if equality could come at once, the Negro would not be ready for it. I submit that the white American is even more unprepared.”

“I show up ready to play, so I normally try and fit the situation.”

“The fact that Eddie Vedder likes to play 3 hour plus shows a night, I have to be ready for that.”

“Everybody's got plans... until they get hit.”

“The art of living is more like wrestling than dancing, in so far as it stands ready against the accidental and the unforeseen, and is not apt to fall.”

“I bought me a spy-glass some weeks since. I buy but a few things, and those not till long after I begin to want them, so that when I do get them I am prepared to make a perfect use of them and extract their whole sweet.”

“Doctors keep their scalpels and other instruments handy, for emergencies. Keep your philosophy ready too - ready to understand heaven and earth. In everything you do, even the smallest thing, remember the chain that links them. Nothing earthly succeeds by ignoring heaven, nothing heavenly by ignoring earth.”

“Times change so quickly that if you and I don't keep up with the times, we'll find ourselves with an umbrella in our hand, over our head, when the sun is out. Or we'll find ourselves standing in the rain, with the umbrella inside the door.”

“It is desirable that a man be clad so simply that he can lay his hands on himself in the dark, and that he live in all respects so compactly and preparedly, that, if an enemy take the town, he can, like the old philosopher, walk out the gate empty-handed without anxiety.”

“The time to repair the roof is when the sun is shining.”

“Save when you can and not when you have to.”

“To be prepared for war is one of the most effective means of preserving peace.”

“A free people ought not only to be armed, but disciplined; to which end a uniform and well-digested plan is requisite; and their safety and interest require that they should promote such manufactories as tend to render them independent of others for essential, particularly military, supplies.”

“If we desire to avoid insult, we must be able to repel it; if we desire to secure peace, one of the most powerful instruments of our rising prosperity, it must be known, that we are at all times ready for War.”

“Among the many interesting objects which will engage your attention that of providing for the common defense will merit particular regard. To be prepared for war is one of the most effectual means of preserving peace.”

“We must take care always to keep ourselves, by suitable establishments, in a respectable defensive posture.”

“[L]eave nothing to the uncertainty of procuring a warlike apparatus at the moment of public danger.”

“Avoiding occasions of expense by cultivating peace, we should remember also that timely disbursements to prepare for danger frequently prevent much greater disbursements to repel it”

“When you see a rattlesnake poised to strike, you do not wait until he has struck to crush him.”

“Better to have, and not need, than to need, and not have.”

“If you hold your fire until you see the whites of his eyes, you will never know what hit you.”

“The superior person gathers his weapons together in order to provide against the unforeseen.”

“The superior man, when resting in safety, does not forget that danger may come.”

“Wise Man: One who sees the storm coming before the clouds appear.”