Britain Quotes - Page 12

• I joined the British Army because she stood between Ireland and an enemy common to our civilization, and I would not have her (Britain) say that she defended us while we did nothing at home but pass resolutions.

  Francis Ledwidge

  Home, Army, Civilization

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• More Irishmen died fighting for Britain in World War I than died fighting against her in all of Ireland's bids for independence combined.

  David Frum

  War, Fighting, History

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• Much of the world today, including the United States, is still living in the social, cultural, and political aftermath of Britain's cultural achievements, its industrial revolution, its government of checks and balances, and its conquests around the world.

  Thomas Sowell

  Government, History, Achievement

  Thomas Sowell (2008). “Conquests And Cultures: An International History”, p.67, Basic Books

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• Britain, the first industrial nation, had offered the world a remarkable public experiment in liberal, capitalist democracy whose success was premised upon free trade and world peace. Tuesday, 4 August 1914 brought that experiment to an abrupt halt.

  Kenneth O. Morgan

  August, Tuesday, History

  Kenneth O. Morgan (1984). “The Oxford Illustrated History of Britain”, p.522, Oxford University Press, USA

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• We had to do what we had to do - Britain is great again.

  Margaret Thatcher

  History, British History

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• I live a perfectly happy and comfortable life in Blair's Britain, but I can't work up much affection for the culture we've created for ourselves: it's too cynical, too knowing, too ironic, too empty of real value and meaning.

  Jonathan Coe

  Real, Knowing, Cynical

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• No, people back home don't realize why there is this kind of need for heroes in America at the moment. People in Britain don't really understand what's going on here. They don't understand why Camp X-ray exists.

  Jon Ronson

  Hero, Home, America

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• The effect on the planet of having one child less is an order of magnitude greater than all these other things we might do, such as switching off lights. The greatest thing anyone in Britain could do to help the future of the planet would be to have one less child.

  John Guillebaud

  Children, Order, Light

  " The Green War on Children" by Michelle Malkin, www.realclearpolitics.com. October 08, 2010.

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• The Welsh are not like any other people in Britain, and they know how separate they are. They are the Celts, the tough little wine-dark race who were the original possessors of the island, who never mixed with the invaders coming later from the east, but were slowly driven into the western mountains.

  Laurie Lee

  Wine, Dark, Islands

  Laurie Lee (2015). “I Can't Stay Long”, p.89, Penguin UK

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• The wisdom and spirit of Churchill not only saved Britain from the Third Reich but saved Western civilization from a Nazi Dark Ages when no other nation was willing to take up that defense. Churchill was the greatest military, political and spiritual leader of the 20th century.

  Victor Davis Hanson

  Spiritual, Military, Dark

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• I was the first home-grown sex symbol, rather like Britain`s naughty seaside postcards. When Marilyn Monroe`s first film was shown here [The Asphalt Jungle (1950)], a columnist actually wrote: `How much like our Diana Dors she is`.

  Diana Dors

  Sex, Home, Naughty

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• I look upon Virginia as a rib taken from Britain's side... While they both proceed as living under the marriage-compact, this Eve might thrive so long as her Adam flourishes. Whatever serpent shall tempt her to go astray etc [will only cause] her husband to rule more strictly over her.

  Alexander Spotswood

  Husband, Taken, Virginia

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• The epithets of parent and child have been long applied to Great Britain and her colonies, [but] we rarely see anything from your side of the water except the authoritative style of a master to a school-boy.

  George Mason

  Children, School, Boys

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• Has the grim savage rushed again from the wilderness? Or does some fiend... twang her deadly arrows at our breast? No, none of these: it is the hand of Britain that inflicts the wound.

  Joseph Warren

  Hands, Arrows, Doe

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• During the late war I had an infallible rule for deciding what Great Britain would do on every occasion. It was, to consider what they ought to do, and to take the reverse of that as what they would assuredly do, and I can say with truth that I was never deceived.

  Thomas Jefferson

  War, Late, Deceived

  Thomas Jefferson (2006). “The Quotable Jefferson”

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• ...the discovery, that at no time did this man (Hitler) pose or intend a real threat to Britain or the Empire.

  David Irving

  Real, War, Men

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• By the time I had finished my coffee and returned to the streets, the rain had temporarily abated, but the streets were full of vast puddles where the drains where unable to cope with the volume of water. Correct me if I'm wrong, but you would think that if one nation ought by now to have mastered the science of drainage, Britain would be it.

  Bill Bryson

  Rain, Coffee, Thinking

  Bill Bryson (2010). “Notes From A Small Island: Journey Through Britain”, p.279, Random House

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• Bargaining is a repulsive habit; compromise is one of the highest human virtues - the difference between the two being that the first is practised on the Continent, the latter in Great Britain.

  George Mikes

  Funny, Humorous, Two

  George Mikes (1986). “How to be a Brit: The Classic Bestselling Guide”, p.50, Penguin UK

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• Britain has squandered its windfall of natural resources from North Sea oil and gas. Instead of prudently investing the 'unearned income' from nature, to build a safe, clean and green energy supply for the nation, we face unnecessary shortages. But there is still a chance to put the proceeds from liquidating our fossil fuel assets to better and more appropriate use. Instead of oil companies profiteering from climate change and oil depletion, a windfall tax could establish an Oil Legacy Fund to pay for Britain's urgent transition to a sustainable, decentralised energy system

  Andrew Simms

  Oil, Sea, Pay

  "Fund clean energy with oil tax" by Terry Macalister, www.theguardian.com. October 22, 2006.

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• In Britain, an attractive woman is somehow suspect. If there is talent as well, it is overshadowed. Beauty and brains just can't be entertained; someone has been too extravagant. This does not happen in America or on the Continent, for the looks of a woman are considered a positive advertisement for her gifts and don't detract from them.

  Vivien Leigh

  America, Brain, Doe

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• Old man, 40 years old against young hungry man from Great Britain!

  Vitali Klitschko

  Motivation, Men, Years

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• Britain gets the architecture it deserves. We don’t value architecture, we don’t take it seriously, we don’t want to pay for it and the architect isn’t trusted.

  David Chipperfield

  Want, Pay, Architecture

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• Suddenly, in the space of a moment, I realized what it was that I loved about Britain - which is to say, all of it. Every last bit of it, good and bad - old churches, country lanes, people saying 'Mustn't grumble,' and 'I'm terribly sorry but,' people apologizing to ME when I conk them with a careless elbow, milk in bottles, beans on toast, haymaking in June, seaside piers, Ordnance Survey maps, tea and crumpets, summer showers and foggy winter evenings - every bit of it.

  Bill Bryson

  Summer, Country, Sorry

  "Notes from a Small Island". Book by Bill Bryson, 1995.

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• The American dream? We don't have a dream in Britain because we're bloody awake!

  Al Murray

  Dream, America, World

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• The fact is that Britain is the most warlike nation on earth. In the history of armed combat, we are the only democracy to have declared war on another democracy - England versus Finland in the second world war, in case you're interested - and we're always at the front of the queue when Johnny Foreigner gets a bit uppity. Who stood up to the Kaiser? Who stood up to Adolf? And let's not forget the Argies. What other country would have sent its fleet halfway round the world and lost 250 men to protect a flock of sheep and some oil that might or might not be there? We're still at it.

  Jeremy Clarkson

  Country, War, Men

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