Quotes Library

October 22, 2025

Minorities…are almost always in the right.

Sydney Smith (1771–1845), English clergyman, essayist, H. Pearson, The Smith of Smiths (1934), Jay p.344

Was not the early Greek philosopher Heraclitus right, that all the world is in flux? And is it not true that most change is incremental, and that change-agents begin as a tiny group that grows? That this minority—who first broached the change that so many other have embraced over time—is then (almost) always right?

Right, as to substance, maybe. But right because they have the right to exist, absolutely.


More Quotes

December 23, 2025
Few revolutionists would be such if they were heirs to a baronetcy.
May 4, 2025
There is nothing more tyrannical than a strong popular feeling among a democratic people.
August 11, 2025
We are here to consult the interests and not to obey the will of the people, if we honestly believe that will conflicts with those interests.
Page 121 of 124