War & Peace Quote by Daniel Defoe

Power, Defoe implies, is a force multiplier: leadership can turn timid material into something formidable, while weak command can waste the fiercest advantage. The line lands because it’s built as a clean, brutal swap - lion/sheep, head/army - a little piece of rhetorical engineering that makes its argument feel like common sense. It’s not trying to flatter “the people.” It’s warning them, and especially warning those who presume that raw strength wins wars.

The subtext is less zoology than management. Sheep and lions aren’t personalities so much as metaphors for morale, coordination, and resolve - the invisible infrastructure of collective action. An “army of lions” sounds unbeatable until you picture it without discipline: courage without direction becomes chaos, even mutiny. A “lion” at the top isn’t just brave; it’s decisive, feared, and legible. The army can borrow that identity. People fight harder when they believe someone knows what they’re doing and will bear the cost of doing it.

Context matters: Defoe is writing in a Britain that’s building a modern state - with standing armies, party politics, financial speculation, and a booming print culture that turns public opinion into a battlefield. As a journalist, he’s attuned to how narratives of competence and cowardice travel. The quote doubles as a political argument: institutions and manpower are nothing without command that can convert them into power. It’s also a jab at complacent elites - the worst leader isn’t the villain; it’s the soft, self-protective “sheep” who wastes everyone else’s courage.