"Fella I once knew in El Paso, one day he took all his clothes off and jumped in a mess of cactus. I asked him the same question, why? He said it seemed to be a good idea at the time."

"The reason I understand your problem so well is that I walked into the same trap myself. Yeah. First day we got here I started thinking, maybe I could put my gun away. Settle down, get a little land, raise some cattle. The things these people know about me would work to my credit, it wouldn't work against me. I... just didn't want you to think you were the only sucker in town."

"We deal in lead, friend."

"Reminds me of that fella back home who fell off a ten-story building. As he was falling, people on each floor kept hearing him say, "So far, so good." Heh, so far, so good."

"You don't happen to have an older, grateful sister, do you?"

"You know, I've been in some towns where the girls weren't very pretty. Matter of fact, I've been in some towns where they were downright ugly. But this is the first time I've ever been in a town where there are no girls at all — 'cept little ones."

"I took a job in a grocery store. Fella says I'll make a crackerjack clerk. Crackerjack."

"I never rode shotgun on a hearse before. Gettin' up there don't bother me. It's stayin' up there that I mind."

"The Old Man was right. Only the farmers won. We lost. We'll always lose."

"I'll tell you what I can do: I can kill the first man who so much as whispers a word about giving up. The very first man, so help me, I'll blow his head off!"

"He's a good gun, and we aren't going to a church social."

"Harry, please don't understand me so fast."

"Once you begin you've got to be ready for killing and more killing, and then still more killing, until the reason for it is gone."

"Sorry, I'm not in the blessing business."

"Graveyards are full of boys who are very young and very proud."

"I've been offered a lot for my work, but never everything."

"It's only a matter of knowing how to shoot a gun. Nothing big about that."

"If he rides in with no idea of the reception we can prepare for him... I promise you, we'll all teach him something about the price of corn."

"There's no need to apologize. We weren't expecting flowers and speeches."

"Another speaker, Amanda Milius, is the daughter of John Milius, who was the screenwriter for the first two Dirty Harry films and Apocalypse Now. She grew up in L.A. and wound up in the Trump administration. She argued that America needs to get back to making self-confident movies like The Searchers, the 1956 John Ford Western. This was an unapologetic movie, she asserted, about how Americans tamed the West and how Christian values got brought to “savage, undeveloped land.” This is about as dumb a reading of The Searchers as it’s possible to imagine. The movie is actually the modern analogue to the Oresteia, by Aeschylus. The complex lead figure, played by John Wayne, is rendered barbaric and racist while fighting on behalf of westward pioneers. By the end, he is unfit to live in civilized society. But we don’t exactly live in an age that acknowledges nuance. Milius distorts the movie into a brave manifesto of anti-woke truths—and that sort of distortion has a lot of buyers among this crowd."

"It just so happens we be Texicans. Texican is nothin' but a human man way out on a limb, this year and next. Maybe for a hundred more. But I don't think it'll be forever. Some day, this country's gonna be a fine good place to be. Maybe it needs our bones in the ground before that time can come."

"[repeated line] That'll be the day !"

"Let's go home, Debbie."

"I figure a man's only good for one oath at a time. I gave mine to the Confederate States of America."

"Well, Reverend, that tears it! From now on, you stay out of this. All of ya. I don't want you with me. I don't need ya for what I got to do."

"Our turnin' back don't mean nothin', not in the long run. She's alive, she's safe for a while. They'll keep her and raise her as one of their own til, until she's of an age to... Injun will chase a thing till he thinks he's chased it enough. Then, he quits. Same way when he runs. Seems like he never learns there's such a thing as a critter that'll just keep comin' on. So we'll find 'em in the end, I promise you. We'll find 'em. Just as sure as a turnin' of the earth."

"Natalie Wood - Debbie Edwards (older)"

"Ward Bond - Reverend Clayton"

"Vera Miles - Laurie Jorgensen"

"Jeffrey Hunter - Martin Pawley"

"John Wayne - Ethan Edwards"

"The Biggest, Roughest, Toughest ...and Most Beautiful Picture Ever Made!"

"He had to find her... he had to find her..."

"Damn that Texican! When you need him, he's dead."

"Fill your hand, you son of a bitch!"

"I mean to kill you in one minute, Ned. Or see you hanged in Fort Smith at Judge Parker's convenience. Which'll it be?"

"Ned doesn't go around killing people for no reason. Had he a reason, he'd kill them."

"Young fella, if you're looking for trouble, I'll accommodate you. Otherwise, leave it alone."

"DAMN a man that whistles!"

"It's a shame, a kid like Moon losing his leg. He's too young to be hoppin' around on a raw peg. Loves to dance too much, and sport!"

"LaBoeuf, if you get crosswise of me you'll think a ton of brick had fell on you! You'll wisht you was back at the Alamo with Travis!"

"By God! She reminds me o' me!"

"A fella that carries a big-bore Sharps carbine might come in handy… if we get jumped by elephants, or buffalo, or something."

"General Price don't belong to me. He just rooms with me. Cats don't belong to nobody. 'Course, I depend on him."

"Baby sister, I was born game, and I mean to go out that way."

"Mr. Rat, I have a writ here that says you are to stop eating Chen Lee's cornmeal forthwith. Now, It's a rat writ, writ for a rat, and this is lawful service of same! [to Mattie] See? He doesn't pay any attention to me. '[shoots the rat] You can't serve papers on a rat, baby sister. You either kill him or let him be."

"Papa's marker is not what was ordered. I will make that wool-hatted fool of a stone man change it."

"Rooster Cogburn is no good friend of mine! He led us straight into your hands, and now he has left me with a gang of cut-throats! Is that what they call "grit" in Fort Smith? We call it something else in Yell County."

"My name is Mattie Ross, of Near Dardanelle in Yell County. My family owns property, and I don't know why I'm being treated like this!"

"I'm going! And it's not because you say I can't, and it's not because you say I can. I paid good cash money to be here, and I'm on my own business! Now, we'll have no more talk about it."