Cowardice

Cowardice is the perceived failure to demonstrate sufficient mental robustness and courage in the face of a challenge. Under many military codes of justice, cowardice in the face of combat is a crime punishable by death (cf. shot at dawn). The term describes a personality trait which is viewed as a negative characteristic and has been shunned and disdained (see norms) within most, if not all cultures, while courage, typically viewed as its direct opposite, is generally rewarded and encouraged. Persons who demonstrate cowardice are called cowards, and are usually seen to have avoided or refused to engage in a confrontation or struggle which has been deemed good or righteous by the wider culture in which they live. On a more mundane level, the label may be applied to those who are regarded as too frightened or overwhelmed to defend their rights or those of others from aggressors in their lives.

Sourced

• Grac'd with a sword, and worthier of a fan.
  • William Cowper, The Task (1785), Book I, line 771.

• Cowards are cruel, but the brave
  Love mercy, and delight to save.
  • John Gay, Fables (1727), Part I. Fable 1.

• Who knows himself a braggart,
  Let him fear this, for it will come to pass
  That every braggart shall be found an ass.
  • William Shakespeare, All's Well That Ends Well (1600s), Act IV, scene 3, line 369.

• You souls of geese,
  That bear the shapes of men, how have you run
  From slaves that apes would beat!
  • William Shakespeare, Coriolanus (c. 1607-08), Act I, scene 4, line 35.

• What a slave art thou, to hack thy sword as thou hast done, and then say it was in fight!
  • William Shakespeare, Henry IV, Part I (c. 1597), Act II, scene 4, line 286.

• I may speak it to my shame,
  I have a truant been to chivalry.
  • William Shakespeare, Henry IV, Part I (c. 1597), Act V, scene 1, line 93.

• I would give all my fame for a pot of ale and safety.
  • William Shakespeare, Henry V (c. 1599), Act III, scene 2, line 13.

• So bees with smoke and doves with noisome stench
  Are from their hives and houses driven away.
  They call'd us for our fierceness English dogs;
  Now like to whelps, we crying run away.
  • William Shakespeare, Henry VI, Part I (c. 1588-90), Act I, scene 5, line 23.

• Becomes it thee to taunt his valiant age
  And twit with cowardice a man half dead?
  • William Shakespeare, Henry VI, Part I (c. 1588-90), Act III, scene 2, line 55.

• So cowards fight when they can fly no further;
  As doves do peck the falcon's piercing talons;
  So desperate thieves, all hopeless of their lives,
  Breathe out invectives 'gainst the officers.
  • William Shakespeare, Henry VI, Part III (c. 1591), Act I, scene 4, line 39.

• I hold it cowardice
  To rest mistrustful where a noble heart
  Hath pawn'd an open hand in sign of love.
  • William Shakespeare, Henry VI, Part III (c. 1591), Act IV, scene 2, line 6.

• Thou slave, thou wretch, thou coward!
  Thou little valiant, great in villany!
  Thou ever strong upon the stronger side!
  Thou Fortune's champion, that dost never fight
  But when her humorous ladyship is by
  To teach thee safety!
  • William Shakespeare, King John (1598), Act III, scene 1, line 116.

• Dost thou now fall over to my foes?
  Thou wear a lion's hide! doff it for shame,
  And hang a calf's skin on those recreant limbs.
  • William Shakespeare, King John (1598), Act III, scene 1, line 127.

• Milk-liver'd man!
  That bear'st a cheek for blows, a head for wrongs,
  Who hast not in thy brows an eye discerning
  Thine honor from thy suffering.
  • William Shakespeare, King Lear (1608), Act IV, scene 2, line 50.

• Wouldst thou have that
  Which thou esteem'st the ornament of life,
  And live a coward in thine own esteem,
  Letting "I dare not" wait upon, "I would";
  Like the poor cat i' the adage?
  • William Shakespeare, Macbeth (1605), Act I, scene 7, line 41.

• How many cowards, whose hearts are all as false
  As stairs of sand, wear yet upon their chins
  The beards of Hercules and frowning Mars,
  Who, inward search'd, have livers white as milk.
  • William Shakespeare, The Merchant of Venice (late 1590s), Act III, scene 2, line 83.

• That which in mean men we entitle patience
  Is pale cold cowardice in noble breasts.
  • William Shakespeare, Richard II (c. 1595), Act I, scene 2, line 33.

• By this good light, this is a very shallow monster!—I afear'd of him!—A very weak monster!—The man i' the moon!—A most poor, credulous monster!—Well drawn, monster, in good sooth!
  • William Shakespeare, The Tempest (c. 1610-1612), Act II, scene 2, line 144.

• A coward, a most devout coward, religious in it.
  • William Shakespeare, Twelfth Night (c. 1601-02), Act III, scene 4, line 427.

• Ignavissimus quisque, et ut res docuit, in periculo non ausurus, nimis verbis et lingua feroces.
  • Every recreant who proved his timidity in the hour of danger, was afterwards boldest in words and tongue.
  • Tacitus, Annales (AD 117), IV. 62.

Hoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations

Quotes reported in Hoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations (1922), p. 145-46.

• To see what is right and not to do it is want of courage.
  • Confucius, Analects, Book II, Chapter XXIV.

• That all men would be cowards if they dare,
  Some men we know have courage to declare.
  • George Crabbe, Tale I, The Dumb Orators, line 11.

• The coward never on himself relies,
  But to an equal for assistance flies.
  • George Crabbe, Tale III, The Gentleman Farmer, line 84.

• Der Feige droht nur, wo er sicher ist.
  • The coward only threatens when he is safe.
  • Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Torquato Tasso, II. 3. 207.

• When desp'rate ills demand a speedy cure,
  Distrust is cowardice, and prudence folly.
  • Samuel Johnson, Irene, Act IV, scene 1.

• He
  That kills himself to avoid misery, fears it,
  And, at the best, shows but a bastard valour.
  This life's a fort committed to my trust,
  Which I must not yield up, till it be forced:
  Nor will I. He's not valiant that dares die,
  But he that boldly bears calamity.
  • Philip Massinger, Maid of Honour, Act IV, scene 3.

• Men lie, who lack courage to tell truth—the cowards!
  • Joaquin Miller, Ina, scene 3.

• Timidi est optare necem.
  • To wish for death is a coward's part.
  • Ovid, Metamorphoses, IV. 115.

• Virtutis expers verbis jactans gloriam
  Ignotos fallit, notis est derisui.
  • A coward boasting of his courage may deceive strangers, but he is a laughing-stock to those who know him.
  • Phaedrus, Fables, I. 11. 1.

• Vous semblez les anguilles de Melun; vous criez devant qu'on vous escorche.
  • You are like the eels of Melun; you cry out before you are skinned.
  • François Rabelais, Gargantua.

• Canis timidus vehementius latrat quam mordet.
  • A cowardly cur barks more fiercely than it bites.
  • Quintus Curtius Rufus, De Rebus Gestis Alexandri Magni, VII, 4, 13.

• When all the blandishments of life are gone,
  The coward sneaks to death, the brave live on.
  • Dr. Sewell, The Suicide.

• Timidus se vocat cautum, parcum sordidus.
  • The coward calls himself cautious, the miser thrifty.
  • Syrus, Maxims.

• The man that lays his hand on woman,
  Save in the way of kindness, is a wretch
  Whom 'twere gross flattery to name a coward.
  • John Tobin, The Honeymoon, Act II, scene 1.

• Adieu, canaux, canards, canaille.
  • Voltaire, summing up his Impressions de Voyage, on his return from the Netherlands.