British Resilience Quotes

These cruel, wanton, indiscriminate bombings of London are, of course, a part of Hitler's invasion plans. He hopes, by killing large numbers of civilians, and women and children, that he will terrorise and cow the people of this mighty imperial city ... Little does he know the spirit of the British nation, or the tough fibre of the Londoners.

I’ll put the “Great” back into Great Britain

We (The British) have not journeyed across the centuries, across the oceans, across the mountains, across the prairies, because we are made of sugar candy.

England has saved herself by her exertions, and will, as I trust, save Europe by her example.

One thing Britons have always been celebrated for, and that is being able to stick it out in a tight place.

Margaret Thatcher, growing up in a bombed and battered Britain, derived a distrust which has grown with the years not just of Germany but of all continental Europe.

Well, I'm British. I'm proud to be British and I love this country. I'm going nowhere.

That is the nature of the British psyche. It's very blunt, plain, very linear. It's pragmatic: it records life as it is.

I considered the attacks on London useless, and I told the Fuhrer again and again that inasmuch as I knew the English people as well as I did my own people, I could never force them to their knees by attacking London. We might be able to subdue the Dutch people by such measures but not the British.

An Englishman, being flattered, is a lamb; threatened, a lion.

The English are loth to express their feelings, but in my stall in the choir I could feel the pent-up, passionate emotion, and also the fear of the congregation, not of death or wounds or material loss, but of defeat and the final ruin of Britain.

They're very harsh people, the British: hard to impress, very tough on each other, but I rather like that. It's not that the British are more honest - you're just under no illusion with them.

I'm still committed to the success of the U.K. and the belief of the strong intelligence and passion and determination of the British people. I'm a strong believer of their long-term historical success.

The spirit of Dunkirk is something everyone grew up learning about. After Dunkirk, everyone came together and it set the tone in the U.K.

We should lay aside every hindrance and endeavour by uniting the whole force and spirit of our people to raise again a great British nation standing up before all the world; for such a nation, rising in its ancient vigour, can even at this hour save civilization.

I studied in Britain and spent great moments of my life there as a student living in Belsize Park. I admire the British trait of the stiff upper lip in the face of adversity. My wife studied in Britain, too, and both of us have many friends there.

The British don't runaway from terrorism. We have had 30-odd years of terrorism in our own country from the Irish Republican Army. We're used to it.

The English can laugh and at the same time strike you down, without the least compunction. It is the secret of their success as a nation.