Related:

• Nothing except a battle lost can be half so melancholy as a battle won.
  -- Arthur Wellesley, Duke of Wellington (1769-1852) -- Despatch, 1815...
• Humanity has won its battle. Liberty now has a country.
  -- Marquis de Lafayette, on the birth of the United State...
• To bring one's self to a frame of mind and to the proper energy to accomplish things that require plain hard work continuously is the one big battle that everyone has.
  When this battle is won for all time, then everything is easy. -- Thomas A. Buckne...
• For freedom's battle, once begun, Bequeath'd by bleeding sire to son, Though baffled oft, is ever won.
  -- Lord Byron (1788-1824) -- The Giaour, Line 123...
• It's something of a tradition Guinan - the captain touring the ship before a battle.
  Before a hopeless battle if I remember the tradition correctly....
• 1 W. When shall we three meet again In thunder, lightning, or in rain?
  2 W. When the hurlyburly 's done, When the battle 's lost and won....
• But to the hero, when his sword Has won the battle for the free, Thy voice sounds like a prophet's word
  And in its hollow tones are heard The thanks of millions yet to be....
• I won! I won!
• I guess I've been so wrapped up in playing the game that I never took time enough to figure out where the goal line was -- what it meant to win -- or even how you won.
  -- Cash McCall...