Monarchy Quotes - Page 9

• There is a peculiar contradiction in trying to be a member of a republic while believing that the universe is a monarchy.

  Alan Watts

  Believe, Trying, Peculiar

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• The French under the old monarchy held it for a maxim that the king could do no wrong . The Americans entertain the same opinion with respect to the majority.... If ever the free institutions of America are destroyed, that event may be attributed to the omnipotence of the majority.

  Alexis de Tocqueville

  Kings, Omnipotence, America

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• Technically, the city of Ankh-Morpork is a Tyranny, which is not always the same thing as a monarchy, and in fact even the post of Tyrant has been somewhat redefined by the incumbent, Lord Vetinari, as the only form of democracy that works. Everyone is entitled to vote, unless disqualified by reason of age or not being Lord Vetinari.

  Terry Pratchett

  Cities, Tyrants, Democracy

  Stephen Briggs, Terry Pratchett (2015). “Unseen Academicals”, p.13, Oberon Books

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• I bold it impossible, that the great monarchies of Europe can subsist much longer; they all affect magnificence and splendor.

  Jean-Jacques Rousseau

  Thinking, Europe, Lasts

  "Émilius, Or, A Treatise on Education".

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• Louis XVI started to die on June 21st 1791. For his flight tore away the veil of that false constitutional monarchy, and once more confronted the Patriot party with the whole problem of the revolution's future.

  Francois Furet

  Party, June, Revolution

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• Monarchy is an outrage which even the blind of an entire people cannot justify... all men hold from nature the secret mission to destroy wherever it my be found. No man can reign innocently. The folly is too evident. Every king is a rebel and a usurper. Do kings themselves treat otherwise those who seek to usurp their authority?

  Louis Antoine de Saint-Just

  Kings, Men, People

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• To recommend a monarchy on account of the prosperity it gives the provinces seems to me like recommending that a man should have liberty to treat his children as slaves, if at the same time he treats his slaves with reasonable consideration.

  Robert Graves

  Children, Men, Should Have

  Robert Graves, Richard Francis (2000). “I, Claudius ; and, Claudius the god”, Carcanet Press Ltd.

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• The state of monarchy is the supremest thing upon earth: for kings are not only God's Lieutenants upon earth, and sit upon God's throne, but even by God himself they are called Gods.

  King James I

  Kings, Divine Right, Thrones

  Speech to Parliament at Whitehall, March 21, 1609.

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• I grew up between the two world wars and received a rather solid general education, the kind middle class children enjoyed in a country whose educational system had its roots dating back to the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy.

  George Andrew Olah

  Country, Children, War

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• It is not, perhaps, unreasonable to conclude, that a pure and perfect democracy is a thing not attainable by man, constituted as he is of contending elements of vice and virtue, and ever mainly influenced by the predominant principle of self-interest. It may, indeed, be confidently asserted, that there never was that government called a republic, which was not ultimately ruled by a single will, and, therefore, (however bold may seem the paradox,) virtually and substantially a monarchy.

  Alexander Fraser Tytler

  Men, Self, Perfect

  " Universal History: From the Creation of the World to the Beginning of the Eighteenth Century, Vol. I" by Alexander Fraser Tytler, Petridge and Company, (p. 216), 1854.

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• Generally the officers of the army were indifferent whether the annexation [of Texas] was consummated or not; but not so all of them. For myself, I was bitterly opposed to the measure, and to this day regard the war, which resulted, as one of the most unjust ever waged by a stronger against a weaker nation. It was an instance of a republic following the bad example of European monarchies, in not considering justice in their desire to acquire additional territory.

  Ulysses S. Grant

  War, Army, Texas

  Ulysses S. Grant (2013). “The Personal Memoirs of General U. S.”, p.20, Simon and Schuster

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• The protection of the masses has in all times been the pretense of tyranny - the plea of monarchy, of aristocracy, of special privilege of every kind. The slave owners justified slavery as protecting the slaves.

  Henry George

  Slave Owners, Special, Aristocracy

  Henry George (2006). “Protection Or Free Trade”, p.21, Cosimo, Inc.

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• It serves notice that President Bush is serious about promoting freedom, because free societies are a lot more peaceable than dictatorships and monarchies.

  Tony Snow

  President, Serious, Dictatorship

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• Republics end through luxury; monarchies through poverty.

  Baron de Montesquieu

  Tyrants, Luxury, Republic

  "The Spirit of the Laws" by Charles de Secondat, Baron de Montesquieu, Book VII: Consequences of the Different Principles of the Three Governments with Respect to Sumptuary Laws, Luxury and the Condition of Women, Ch. 4: Of Sumptuary Laws in a Monarchy, 1748.

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• It’s unlikely to change – there’s nothing in King Salman’s past as governor of Riyadh for about forty years that suggests that he was particularly a reformer, not on the role of women, not on democratic development. There’s been a rumor in the last couple of days that he said to someone in an e-mail that he’s in favor of a constitutional monarchy, but I would be surprised if the level of repression started to go down … I think the kind of thing that we would view as significant reforms is unlikely.

  Elliott Abrams

  Kings, Couple, Thinking

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• Our top-down pyramid style of management is a very old concept borrowed from centuries of war and monarchies.

  James Hunter

  War, Top Down, Pyramids

  James C. Hunter (2008). “The Servant: A Simple Story About the True Essence of Leadership”, p.56, Crown Business

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• The result of cutting [political power] up into little bits is simply that the man who can sweep the greatest number into one heap will govern the rest... In a pure democracy the ruling men will be the wirepullers and their friends; but they will no more be on an equality with the voters than soldiers of Ministers of State are on an equality with the subjects of monarchy.

  James Fitzjames Stephen

  Cutting, Men, Numbers

  James Fitzjames Stephen (1873). “Liberty, Equality, Fraternity”, p.240

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• Korell is that frequent phenomenon in history : the republic whose ruler has every attribute of the absolute monarch but the name. It therefore enjoyed the usual despotism unrestrained even by those two moderating influences in the legitimate monarchies: regal "honor" and court etiquette.

  Isaac Asimov

  Names, Two, Honor

  Isaac Asimov (1991). “Great Tales of the Golden Age of Science Fiction”, Bbs Publishing Corporation

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• In chess, bigamy is acceptable but monarchy is absolute.

  Garry Kasparov

  Chess, Bigamy, Acceptable

  Garry Kasparov (2010). “How Life Imitates Chess: Making the Right Moves, from the Board to the Boardroom”, p.59, Bloomsbury Publishing USA

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• Investors, monarchies, and parliamentarians devised methods to control the processes of wealth accumulation and the power that came with it, but the ideology behind gold fever mobilized settlers to cross the Atlantic to an unknown fate. Subjugating entire societies and civilizations, enslaving whole countries, and slaughtering people village by village did not seem too high a price to pay, nor did it appear inhumane. The systems of colonization were modern and rational, but its ideological basis was madness.

  Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz

  Country, Fate, Civilization

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• Scandal, it bears repeating, undermines monarchies, but rarely ends them. It may be true that, according to a recent editorial in the New York Times, the British monarchy now exists primarily 'for our amusement'. But as long as people find it amusing, and want to be amused by it, they will be happy to see it undermined but uneager to kill it off.

  David Cannadine

  New York, Long, People

  David Cannadine (1998). “History in Our Time”, Penguin Group USA

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• Of all the memorable phrases that have been minted and mobilised to describe modern British royalty, 'constitutional monarchy' is virtually the only one which seemes to have neither been anticipated nor invented by Walter Bagehot. It was he who insisted that 'a princely marriage is the brilliant edition of a universal fact, and as such it rivets mankind'; and he who warned that the monarchy's 'mystery is its life. We must not let in daylight upon magic'.

  David Cannadine

  Memorable, Magic, Phrases

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• Vernon Bogdanor's account The Monarchy and the Constitution is written as much in the shadow of Edmund Burke as it is of Walter Bagehot. He stresses the organic development of the British constitution, prefers evolution to revolution, and thinks stability is better than strife.

  David Cannadine

  Stress, Thinking, Shadow

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• More attention should have been given to the fundamental transformation which took place during Queen Victoria's reign, from ruling sovereign to constitutional monarch. Again, gender mattered. If Albert had lived, it seems clear that he would have resisted that development much more tenaciously, which the gradual emasculation (and feminization) of monarchy was probably more easily accomplished when a woman was on the throne.

  David Cannadine

  Queens, Should Have, Sovereign

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• An occasional insurrection will not weigh against the inconveniences of a government of force, such as are monarchies and aristocracies.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Wisdom, Government, Aristocracy

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