King’s line concedes everything except the direction
Fly, run, walk, crawl. It is the only quotation in this room that admits how bad things might get, and it admits it four times in one sentence. Each clause gives ground on speed, dignity and capability — and none of them gives ground on where you are pointed. That is what separates it from the rest of the genre, which tends to insist you are stronger than you feel. King assumes you may not be, and asks for the one thing that remains available anyway.
Xunzi in 300 BC, Churchill three times
Two thousand three hundred years separate the oldest line here from the newest, and Churchill appears three times — more than anyone else, and for a reason the room makes visible. He is the only person in either collection whose reputation for persistence rests on speeches that were recorded verbatim, which means his lines can be checked and most people's cannot. It is also why one of the three is in the Forgery Wing: when a name is that strongly associated with a virtue, sentences migrate to it.
What is the best never give up quote?
Martin Luther King Jr.’s — “if you can’t fly then run, if you can’t run then walk, if you can’t walk then crawl.” It is the only one that concedes how bad the situation might be while still asking for something achievable.
Did Harriet Tubman say “if you hear the dogs, keep going”?
It is widely credited to her and cannot be traced to a contemporary record, so it is labelled attributed here. The imagery matches the escape routes she led people along at night.
What is the full version of “Courage is the first of human qualities because it is the quality which gu…”?
Credited to Aristotle almost everywhere; it is Churchill, writing about Alfonso XIII of Spain. His own sentence marks the second half as a quotation — “Courage is rightly esteemed the first of human qualities, because, as has been said, ‘it is the quality which guarantees all others’” — so even Churchill was passing something on. The collection cites it to Great Contemporaries, 1937 — first in Collier’s, 27 June 1931.
What is the full version of “Never give in, never give in, never, never, never, never.”?
Usually shortened to three words. The sentence continues “in nothing, great or small, large or petty, never give in except to convictions of honour and good sense” — which restores an exception the short version removes. The collection cites it to Address at Harrow School, 29 October 1941.