Rudyard Kipling Quotes

I keep six honest serving men. (They taught me all I know) Their names are What and Why and When and How and Where and Who.
Rudyard Kipling
And only the Master shall praise us and only the Master shall blame And no one shall work for money and no one shall work for fame But each for the joy of the working and each in his separate star Shall draw the Thing as he sees It for the God of things as They Are!
Rudyard Kipling
Words are the most powerful drug used by mankind.
Rudyard Kipling
A fool there was and he made his prayer (Even as you and I!) To a rag and a bone and a hank of hair (We called her the woman who did not care) But the fool he called her his lady fair - (Even as you or I!)
Rudyard Kipling
A woman's guess is much more accurate than a man's certainty.
Rudyard Kipling
An' I learned about women from 'er.
Rudyard Kipling
The colonel's lady and Judy O'Grady Are sisters under their skins.
Rudyard Kipling
For the female of the species is more deadly than the male.
Rudyard Kipling
A rag and a bone and a hank of hair.
Rudyard Kipling
Down to Gehenna or up to the throne He travels the fastest who travels alone.
Rudyard Kipling
A woman is only a woman but a good cigar is a smoke.
Rudyard Kipling
Fill the unforgiving minute with sixty seconds worth of distance run.
Rudyard Kipling
No one thinks of Winter when the grass is green.
Rudyard Kipling
For it's Tommy this an' Tommy that and "Chuck 'im out the brute." But it's "Savior of 'is country " when the guns begin to shoot.
Rudyard Kipling
All the people like us are We And everyone else is They.
Rudyard Kipling
The sin they do by two and two they must pay for one by one.
Rudyard Kipling
Nations have passed away and left no traces And history gives the naked cause of it - One single simple reason in all cases They fell because their peoples were not fit.
Rudyard Kipling
There are nine and sixty ways of constructing tribal lays and every single one of them is right.
Rudyard Kipling
There are nine and sixty ways of constructing tribal lays and every single one of them is right.
Rudyard Kipling
If I were hanged on the highest hill Mother o' mine O mother o' mine! I know whose love would follow me still Mother o' mine O mother o' mine!
Rudyard Kipling
If you can keep your head when all about you Are losing theirs and blaming it on you If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you But make allowance for their doubting too Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it And - which is more - you'll be a man my son!
Rudyard Kipling
Though I've belted you and flayed you By the livin' Gawd that made you You're a better man than I am Gunga Din.
Rudyard Kipling
Make ye no truce with Adam-zad - the Bear that walks like a man.
Rudyard Kipling
Sing for faith and hope are high - None so true as you and I - Sing the Lovers' Litany: "Love like ours can never die!"
Rudyard Kipling
Take up the white man's burden - Send forth the best ye breed - Go bind your sons to exile To serve your captives' need.
Rudyard Kipling
Still stands thine ancient sacrifice - An humble and a contrite heart.
Rudyard Kipling
They're hangin' Danny Deever in the morning!
Rudyard Kipling
Gawd knows and 'E won't split on a pal.
Rudyard Kipling
We have forty million reasons for failure but not a single excuse.
Rudyard Kipling
For the colonel's lady an' Judy O'Grady Are sisters under their skins.
Rudyard Kipling
What should they know of England who only England know?
Rudyard Kipling
If you hit a pony over the nose at the outset of your acquaintance he may not love you but he will take a deep interest in your movements ever afterwards.
Rudyard Kipling
There was a small boy of Quebec Who was buried in snow to the neck: When they said 'Are you friz?' He replied 'Yes I is - But we don't call this cold in Quebec!'
Rudyard Kipling
It's clever but is it art?
Rudyard Kipling
One can’t prescribe books, even the best books, to people unless one knows a good deal about each individual person.
Rudyard Kipling
I always try to believe the best of everybody -it saves so much trouble.
Rudyard Kipling
Whatever he knows of his weaknesses, Private Mulvaney is wholly ignorant of his strength.
Rudyard Kipling
A thin grey fog hung over the city, and the streets were very cold; for summer was in England.
Rudyard Kipling
Now India is a place beyond all others where one must not take things too seriously - the mid-day sun always excepted. Too much work and too much energy kill a man as effectively as too much assorted vice or too much drink. Flirtation does not matter, because every one is being transferred, and either you or she leave the station and never return. Good work does not matter, because a man is judged by his worst output, and another man takes all the credit of his best as a rule. Bad work does not matter, because other men do worse, and incompetents hang on longer in India than anywhere else. Amusements do not matter, because you must repeat them as soon as you have accomplished them once, and most amusements only mean trying to win another person's money. Sickness does not matter, because it's all in the day's work, and if you die, another man takes over your place and your office in the eight hours between your death and burial. Nothing matters except Home-furlough and acting allowances, and these only because they are scarce. It is a slack country, where all men work with imperfect instruments, and the wisest thing is to escape as soon as you ever can to some place where amusement is amusement and a reputation worth the having.
Rudyard Kipling
Something hidden. Go and find it. Go and look behind the Ranges -- Something lost behind the Ranges. Lost and waiting for you. Go!
Rudyard Kipling
To hear is one thing, to know is another.
Rudyard Kipling
Barbarians are all alike... sit up half the night to discuss anything a Roman says.
Rudyard Kipling
It was the forty-fathom slumber that clears the soul and eye and heart, and sends you to breakfast ravening. They emptied a big tin dish of juicy fragments of fish- the blood-ends the cook had collected overnight. They cleaned up the plates and pans of the elder mess, who were out fishing, sliced pork for the midday meal, swabbed down the foc'sle, filled the lamps, drew coal and water for the cook, an investigated the fore-hold, where the boat's stores were stacked. It was another perfect day - soft, mild and clear; and Harvey breathed to the very bottom of his lungs.
Rudyard Kipling
O it's Tommy this, and Tommy that, and Tommy 'ow's your soul/But it's thin red line of heroes when the drums begin to roll.
Rudyard Kipling
Now this is the Law of the Jungle -- as old and as true as the sky;And the Wolf that shall keep it may prosper, but the Wolf that shall break it must die.As the creeper that girdles the tree-trunk the Law runneth forward and back --For the strength of the Pack is the Wolf, and the strength of the Wolf is the Pack.
Rudyard Kipling
Something I owe to the soil that grew--More to the life that fed--But most to Allah who gave me two Separate sides of my head. I would go without shirt or shoes, Friends, tobacco, or bread Sooner than for an instant lose Either side of my head.
Rudyard Kipling
One man in a thousand, Solomon says.Will stick more close than a brother.And it's worth while seeking him half your daysIf you find him before the other.---The Thousandth Man
Rudyard Kipling
Anything from Kipling
Rudyard Kipling
The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. To be your own man is hard business. If you try it, you will be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself.
Rudyard Kipling
Everyone is more or less mad on one point.
Rudyard Kipling
Holden went to his bungalow and began to understand that he was not alone in the world, and also that he was afraid for the sake of another, -- which is the most soul-satisfying fear known to man.
Rudyard Kipling
These are the four that are never content: that have never been filled since the dew began-Jacala's mouth, and the glut of the kite, and the hands of the ape, and the eyes of Man.
Rudyard Kipling
Like everything else in the world, it is one man's work.
Rudyard Kipling
Father Wolf looked on amazed. He had almost forgotten the days when he won Mother Wolf in fair fight from five other wolves, when she ran in the Pack and was not called The Demon for compliment’s sake. Shere Khan might have faced Father Wolf, but he could not stand up against Mother Wolf, for he knew that where he was she had all the advantage of the ground, and would fight to the death. So he backed out of the cave mouth growling...
Rudyard Kipling
You may kill for yourselves, and your mates,and your cubs as they need, and you can;But kill not for pleasure of killing, andSEVEN TIMES NEVER KILL MAN.
Rudyard Kipling
The Power of the Dogby Rudyard KiplingThere is sorrow enough in the natural way From men and women to fill our day; And when we are certain of sorrow in store, Why do we always arrange for more? Brothers and Sisters, I bid you beware Of giving your heart to a dog to tear. Buy a pup and your money will buy Love unflinching that cannot lie-- Perfect passion and worship fed By a kick in the ribs or a pat on the head. Nevertheless it is hardly fair To risk your heart for a dog to tear. When the fourteen years which Nature permits Are closing in asthma, or tumour, or fits, And the vet's unspoken prescription runs To lethal chambers or loaded guns, Then you will find--it's your own affair-- But ... you've given your heart to a dog to tear. When the body that lived at your single will, With its whimper of welcome, is stilled (how still!). When the spirit that answered your every mood Is gone--wherever it goes--for good, You will discover how much you care, And will give your heart to a dog to tear. We've sorrow enough in the natural way, When it comes to burying Christian clay. Our loves are not given, but only lent, At compound interest of cent per cent. Though it is not always the case, I believe, That the longer we've kept 'em, the more do we grieve: For, when debts are payable, right or wrong, A short-time loan is as bad as a long-- So why in--Heaven (before we are there) Should we give our hearts to a dog to tear?
Rudyard Kipling
I have my own matches and sulphur, and I'll make my own hell.
Rudyard Kipling
What avail is honour or a sword against a pen?
Rudyard Kipling
Yet there be certain times in a young man’s life, when, through great sorrow or sin, all the boy in him is burnt and seared away so that he passes at one step to the more sorrowful state of manhood
Rudyard Kipling
I am the Cat who walks by himself, and all places are alike to me.
Rudyard Kipling