57 Quotes by Whittaker Chambers

At issue in the Hiss Case was the question whether this sick society, which we call Western civilization, could in its extremity still cast up a man whose faith in it was so great that he would voluntarily abandon those things which men hold good, including life, to defend it.

I know that I am leaving the winning side for the losing side, but it is better to die on the losing side than to live under Communism.

My children, as long as you live, the shadow of the Hiss Case will brush you. In every pair of eyes that rests on you, you will see pass, like a cloud passing behind a woods in winter, the memory of your father - dissembled in friendly eyes, lurking in unfriendly eyes.

On a scale personal enough to be felt by all, but big enough to be symbolic, the two irreconcilable faiths of our time - Communism and Freedom - came to grips in the persons of two conscious and resolute men.

Tragedy occurs when a human soul awakes and seeks, in suffering and pain, to free itself from crime, violence, infamy, even at the cost of life. The struggle is the tragedy - not defeat or death.

A man is not primarily a witness against something. That is only incidental to the fact that he is a witness for something.

Political freedom is a political reading of the Bible.

Human societies, like human beings, live by faith and die when faith dies.

I see in Communism the focus of the concentrated evil of our time.