Great Throughts Treasury

"I began revolution with 82 men. If I had to do it again, I do it with 10 or 15 and absolute faith. It does not matter how small you are if you have faith and plan of action."

"I believe that all of us ought to retire relatively young."

"I dare to repeat the offer."

"I do not think that he is a warmonger... He is the only one who has dared say that Cuba has done something good."

"I don't think anyone has been slandered more than the Jews."

"I dream that one day Americans will come to Cuba to receive treatment."

"I find capitalism repugnant. It is filthy, it is gross, it is alienating... because it causes war, hypocrisy and competition."

"I have a heart of steel."

"I feel my belief in sacrifice and struggle getting stronger. I despise the kind of existence that clings to the miserly trifles of comfort and self-interest. I think that a man should not live beyond the age when he begins to deteriorate, when the flame that lighted the brightest moment of his life has weakened."

"I have concluded - maybe a little late - that speeches must be short."

"I have not seen the Himalayas. But I have seen Sheikh Mujib. In personality and in courage, this man is the Himalayas. I have thus had the experience of witnessing the Himalayas."

"I have reached the conclusion, a bit late perhaps, that speeches should be short. Known for his three-hour speeches, reportedly shortened them to not more than 90 minutes"

"I know that Venezuela is living moments of great expectation and hope. I want to share those hopes with the people of Venezuela."

"I live and perceive again the details as if everything were happening at this moment,"

"I never saw a contradiction between the ideas that sustain me and the ideas of that symbol, of that extraordinary figure, Jesus Christ."

"I never perceived a contradiction in the political revolutionary field between the ideas I maintained and the idea of that symbol, that extraordinary figure who had been so familiar to me since I began to reason."

"I neither will aspire to nor will I accept the position of president of the council of state and commander in chief."

"I made this proposal...as a gesture for the pope and for all Christians... honor for Cuba, and a valiant gesture."

"I propose the immediate launching of a nuclear strike on the United States. The Cuban people are prepared to sacrifice themselves for the cause of the destruction of imperialism and the victory of world revolution."

"I repeat my warmest congratulations and the desire to continue strengthening the existing relations between our two parties, governments and peoples,"

"I realized that my true destiny would be the war that I was going to have with the United States."

"I think only God can punish crimes of such magnitude."

"I send you, the Party, the Government and the Korean people, our most sincere congratulations,"

"I think that a man should not live beyond the age when he begins to deteriorate, when the flame that lighted the brightest moment of his life has weakened."

"I think that it has moved the world. It's something extraordinary, something historic."

"I warn you, I am just beginning! If there is in your hearts a vestige of love for your country, love for humanity, love for justice, listen carefully.... I know that the regime will try to suppress the truth by all possible means; I know that there will be a conspiracy to bury me in oblivion. But my voice will not be stifled — it will rise from my breast even when I feel most alone, and my heart will give it all the fire that callous cowards deny it.... Condemn me. It does not matter. History will absolve me."

"I was a man who was lucky enough to have discovered a political theory, a man who was caught up in the whirlpool of Cuba's political crisis long before becoming a fully fledged Communist ... discovering Marxism was like finding a map in the forest."

"I was asked by many citizens whether I was going to respond... We are all going to respond!"

"I would not vote for the mayor. It's not just because he didn't invite me to dinner, but because on my way into town from the airport there were such enormous potholes."

"I would say that today is a day of truce, perhaps the only one in the course of these 41 years of confrontation with the United States."

"I will not speak of him as if he were absent, he has not been and he will never be. These are not mere words of consolation. Only those of us who feel it truly and permanently in the depths of our souls can comprehend this. Physical life is ephemeral, it passes inexorably... This truth should be taught to every human being -- that the immortal values of the spirit are above physical life. What sense does life have without these values? What then is it to live? Those who understand this and generously sacrifice their physical life for the sake of good and justice -- how can they die? God is the supreme idea of goodness and justice."

"If it takes months, so be it, they will wait it out,"

"If all roads lead to Rome, we can only wish for thousands of roads to lead to Revolutionary Rome!"

"I was closer to heaven here."

"If it weren't for that absurd and ridiculous embargo, the United States could receive vaccinations and other medical procedures from Cuba that could help save American lives."

"I’m not attached to anything. I’m attached to what it feels it's my duty, to do my duty. I think that I will die with the boots on."

"If surviving assassination attempts were an Olympic event, I would win the gold medal."

"If Mohammed can't go to the mountain, the mountain will go to Mohammed,"

"If we are there it is because many people protested against that ridiculous rejection. We shall fight square and fair, despite the fact that they have stolen some good baseball players from us."

"If there ever was in the history of humanity an enemy who was truly universal, an enemy whose acts and moves trouble the entire world, threaten the entire world, attack the entire world in any way or another, that real and really universal enemy is precisely Yankee imperialism."

"If we had paused to tell the people that we were Marxist-Leninists while we were on Pico Turquino and not yet strong, it is possible that we would never have been able to descend to the plains."

"I'm not thinking to cut my beard, because I'm accustomed to my beard and my beard means many things to my country. When we have fulfilled our promise of good government I will cut my beard."

"I'm really happy to reach eighty. I never expected it, not least having a neighbor — the greatest power in the world — trying to kill me every day."

"In the Third World, there are 1.3 billion poor people. In other words, one out of every three inhabitants lives in poverty."

"It (the plan) is a repugnant and immoral maneuver, a rude reply to the pope's proposals... an insult to the Cuban religious institutions and a challenge to the (Cuban) people who resist and will resist with honor,"

"In the four years of your tenure as president, you had the courage to make efforts to change the course of those relations... That is why those of us who were witnesses to that attitude see you with respect."

"In the army of the workers there must be discipline; there must be comradeship, there must be unity; you are the officers of this army, you are the leaders."

"It seems that the empire finally has a new leader. From the new boss, we expect little."

"Is that when men wear in the mind the same ideal, nothing can incomunicarlos, neither prison walls nor the land of the cemeteries, because the same memory, the same soul, the same idea, the same awareness and encourages all dignity."

"It hurts to think about it,"