Britain Quotes - Page 28

• To expect, indeed, that the freedom of trade should ever be entirely restored in Great Britain, is as absurd as to expect that an Oceana or Utopia should never be established in it.

  Adam Smith

  Utopia, Absurd, Should

  Adam Smith, David Buchanan (1817). “An Inquiry Into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations: With Notes, and an Additional Volume”, p.213

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• This regard for the liberties of Europe, this care at one time for the protestant interest, this excessive love for the balance of power, is neither more nor less than a gigantic system of outdoor relief for the aristocracy of Great Britain.

  John Bright

  Europe, Liberty, Balance

  1858 Speech, Birmingham, 29 Oct.

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• Chicken masala is now Britain's true national dish, not only because it is the most popular, but because it is a perfect illustration of the way Britain absorbs and adapts external influences.

  Robin Cook

  Illustration, Perfect, Way

  2001 Speech to the Social Market Foundation, London, 19 Apr.

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• I would gladly say 'Heil Hitler!' and at once part company with him, realizing what a pitiable insult it is to such a great man to try to flatter him with such an imitation which he has always disdained. His way is for Germany, ours is for Britain; let us tread our paths with mutual respect, which is rarely increased by borrowing.

  William Joyce

  Men, Trying, Germany

  "National Socialism Now". Pamphlet issued by the National Socialist League, circa 1938.

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• I know that I have been denounced as a traitor and I resent the accusation, as I conceive myself to have been guilty of no underhand or deceitful act against Britain, although I am also able to understand the resentment that my broadcasts have, in many quarters, aroused.

  William Joyce

  Able, Resentment, Guilty

  Statement given by William Joyce under caution (May 31, 1945) as quoted in "The Trial of William Joyce" edited by J. W. Hall (p. 58), 1946.

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• I have very eclectic taste in music. I like everything from Nirvana, which is featured in the film, to world music, to orchestral and jazz. For me, the nineties were about Oasis, because I was travelling around Britain when that band exploded onto the music scene.

  Isla Fisher

  Oasis, Band, Taste In Music

  "Definitely Maybe - Isla Fisher interview". www.indielondon.co.uk.

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• In countries like the U.S. and Great Britain, we exist in a wholly sexualized culture, where everything from cars to snack food are sold with a healthy slathering of sex to make them more commercially appealing.

  Alan Moore

  Country, Sex, Snacks

  Source: www.avclub.com

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• You can't go by what the governments say or do. It's not the governments. It's on the street where there's more hatred of Americans in Britain than in France.

  Whit Stillman

  Government, Hatred, France

  Interview with Noel Murray, www.avclub.com. February 28, 2006.

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• The way we live in the West we live like kings. People moan about this and that in Britain but we have running water, electricity, security and a rule of law and so many people in the world don't have these.

  Bill Bailey

  Running, Kings, Law

  Source: www.telegraph.co.uk

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• China is incredibly important to the future of mankind. For me, this is something that we all need to have intelligent discussions about in America, in Britain, in Europe. We need to really understand that their destiny and our destiny, Africa's destiny, etc., are all completely tied in. The argument for getting to know your neighbors is very compelling.

  Jamie Hewlett

  Destiny, Intelligent, Europe

  Source: pitchfork.com

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• I don't think I'm prepared to give away my technique to Great Britain. Are you crazy? All I can say is there was a ninja and a fire truck involved, and a great deal of coersion.

  Ryan Reynolds

  Crazy, Thinking, Fire

  Source: www.indielondon.co.uk

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• We were a Western civilisation, an English speaking civilisation, both NZ and Australia, and we had all these influences coming from both Great Britain and America to us; sending us their culture in the shape and form of movies and television.

  Richard O'Brien

  America, Australia, Shapes

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• All Cabinet Ministers and other senior ministers are still sworn in as Privy Counsellors for life. The oath (which dates back to the thirteenth-century and has been described as Britain's oldest secrecy provision) commits them to keep all advice to the monarch secret.

  Clive Ponting

  Senior, Advice, Secret

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• The British happened to the rest of the world. Now the world happens to Britain.

  Andrew Marr

  World, British, Happened

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• My art recognizes the human place, the human context - especially in Britain, which is a landscape so worked by people for thousands of years, written, deeply ingrained with the presence of people.

  Andy Goldsworthy

  Art, Years, People

  "Andy Goldsworthy Goes Into The Wind". Interview with Katherine Cusumano, www.interviewmagazine.com. October 26, 2015.

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• The most striking thing Snowden has revealed is the depth of what the NSA and the Five Eyes countries [Australia, Canada, New Zealand, Great Britain, and the US] are doing, their hunger for all data, for total bulk dragnet surveillance where they try to collect all communications and do it all sorts of different ways. Their ethos is "collect it all."

  Laura Poitras

  Country, Communication, Eye

  Source: www.motherjones.com

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• A man is allowed sufficient freedom of thought, provided he knows how to choose his subject properly.... But the scene is changed as you come homeward, and atheism or treason may be the names given in Britain to what would be reason and truth if asserted in China.

  Edmund Burke

  Men, Names, Atheism

  Edmund Burke (2016). “Delphi Complete Works of Edmund Burke (Illustrated)”, p.46, Delphi Classics

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• Our leaders increasingly see fit to lecture the ethnic minorities on the need to integrate, including of course the need to speak English. What about the need, though, for Britain to integrate with the rest of the world?

  Martin Jacques

  Speak English, Leader, Needs

  "Does it matter if we only speak English?" by Martin Jacques, www.theguardian.com. December 15, 2006.

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• Through its imperialist system Britain brought about untold suffering of millions of people. And this is an historical fact. To be able to admit this would increase the respect, you know, which we have for British institutions.

  Nelson Mandela

  People, Historical, Suffering

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• If you look at the First World War, the Kaiser was actually, actively buying a lot of the armaments from Britain! in the years, in the run-up to the First World War. And I mean, there was a connection there. He was, indeed, Queen Victoria's grandson. You know, they were all related, all these royal families.

  Jacqueline Winspear

  Running, Queens, War

  Source: www.motherjones.com

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• I believe that lack of empathy is behind many problems, and I believe that it's disrupting our society. In Great Britain, there is a steady decline in the willingness to be truly generous, and by that I don't mean monetary generosity, but friendship and sympathy for others.

  J. K. Rowling

  Believe, Mean, Generosity

  Source: www.spiegel.de

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• Just as members of American teachers unions often send their own children to private schools, so unionized workers at government-run hospitals in Britain have insurance that allows them to go to private hospitals. In both cases, those on the inside realize how bad these institutions are, regardless of what they say to those on the outside.

  Thomas Sowell

  Running, Teacher, Children

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• I just went into the studio and did it all in one take. All I was thinking about was the next record; I had already sourced the tracks I wanted to use. I'd been thinking a lot about it and I wanted to represent myself, Leeds and fabric. I'm not very nationalistic, but I wanted to represent what was coming out of Britain as well as at the moment there's a lot of really good new music.

  Ralph Lawson

  Thinking, Track, Use

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• There are times when I wouldn't rule violence out. I personally don't like violence at all. But it wasn't until we had the Trafalgar Square riots that the Poll Tax went out in Britain. When people take to the streets and fight the police, it's the one thing the government can't control. You can march round in circles for the rest of your life and they can ignore it, but once you start damaging property and fighting with the police, they can't. Even though they tar you with a brush and say you're a set of bastards, they have to actually tone down what they are doing.

  Alice Nutter

  Fighting, Circles, Squares

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• The poison was brewed in these West lands but it has spat itself everywhere by now. However far you went you would find the machines, the crowded cities, the empty thrones, the false writings, the barren beds: men maddened with false promises and soured with true miseries, worshipping the iron works of their own hands, cut off from Earth their Mother and from the Father in Heaven. You might go East so far the East became West and you returned to Britain across the great Ocean, but even so you would not have come out anywhere into the light. The shadow of one dark wing is over all Tellus.

  C. S. Lewis

  Mother, Father, Ocean

  C.S. Lewis (1996). “That Hideous Strength”, p.290, Simon and Schuster

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