Quotes Library

March 11, 2025

Finality is not the language of politics.

Benjamin Disraeli (1804-1881), British writer, politician, prime minister, speech in the House of Commons, 28 Feb 1849, Seldes p.109

Does that not suggest that all change is incremental?

Politics is a slow-moving phenomenon and in liberal democratic societies the railway to finality is very long, with too many sidings where many a promising initiative can be parked for a long, long time, and often are.


More Quotes

December 24, 2025
Tories, in short, are atrophied Englishmen, lacking certain moral and intellectual reflexes.
October 17, 2025
[When asked what he had done during the French Revolution] I survived.
August 23, 2025
To think contrary to one’s era is heroism. But to speak against it is madness.
Page 27 of 125