Statesmen Quotes - Page 2

• Public education is a great instrument of social change. Through it, if we so desire, we can make our country more nearly a democracy without classes. To do so will require the efforts of us all-teachers, administrators, taxpayers and statesmen. Education is a social process, perhaps the most important process in determining the future of our country; it should command a far larger portion of our national income than it does today.

  James Bryant Conant

  Education, Country, Teacher

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• It is difficult for a statesman who still has a political future to reveal everything that he knows: and in a profession in which one is a baby at 50 and middle-aged at seventy-five, it is natural that anyone who has not actually been disgraced should feel that he still has a future.

  George Orwell

  Baby, Political, Natural

  George Orwell (1968). “The collected essays, journalism, and letters of George Orwell”

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• That politician who curries favor with the citizens and indulges them and fawns upon them and has a presentiment of their wishes, and is skillful in gratifying them, he is esteemed a great statesman.

  Plato

  Political, Wish, Citizens

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• There are some whom the applause of the multitude has deluded into the belief that they are really statesmen.

  Plato

  Belief, Applause, Multitudes

  Plato (1977). “The Portable Plato”, p.256, Penguin

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• I always considered statesmen to be more expendable than soldiers.

  Harry S. Truman

  Soldier, Politics, Politician

  Harry S. Truman (2014). “1945: Year of Decision”, p.317, New Word City

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• Statesmen are not only liable to give an account of what they say or do in public, but there is a busy inquiry made into their very meals, beds, marriages, and every other sportive or serious action.

  Plutarch

  Giving, Serious, Bed

  Plutarch (1909). “Plutarch's Complete Works”

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• It is not given to princes, statesmen and captains to pierce the mysteries of the future, and even the most penetrating gaze reaches only conclusions which, however seemingly vindicated at a given moment, are inexorably effaced by time.

  Winston Churchill

  Captains, Mystery, Moments

  Winston Churchill (1938). “Marlborough; his life and times”

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• The difference between being an elder statesman And posing successfully as an elder statesman Is practically negligible.

  T. S. Eliot

  Differences, Posing, Elders

  T.S. Eliot (2013). “The Elder Statesman”, p.35, Faber & Faber

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• In the era of imperialism, businessmen became politicians and were acclaimed as statesmen, while statesmen were taken seriously only if they talked the language of succcessful businessmen.

  Hannah Arendt

  Business, Taken, Politics

  Hannah Arendt (1968). “Imperialism: Part Two Of The Origins Of Totalitarianism”, p.30, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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• The great Roman statesman Cicero observed that, 'Not to know what happened before one was born is to be always a child.' In our ignorance of the values that form part of our history and heritage, we Americans have become perpetual children.

  Ilana Mercer

  Children, Ignorance, Heritage

  "A Burning Dilemma Among America's Dhimma". American Daily Herald (americandailyherald.com), May 10, 2013.

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• In the same way that we need statesmen to spare us the abjection of exercising power, we need scholars to spare us the abjection of learning.

  Jean Baudrillard

  Exercise, Power, Abjection

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• Success has always been the greatest liar - and the "work" itself is a success; the great statesman, the conqueror, the discoverer is disguised by his creations, often beyond recognition; the "work," whether of the artist or the philosopher, invents the man who has created it, who is supposed to have create it; "great men," as they are venerated, are subsequent pieces of wretched minor fiction

  Friedrich Nietzsche

  Liars, Artist, Men

  Friedrich Nietzsche (2009). “Basic Writings of Nietzsche”, p.408, Modern Library

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• Peace, commerce and honest friendship with all nations; entangling alliances with none.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Peace, Honesty, War

  First Inaugural Address, 4 Mar. 1801

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• A man who knows how to make good bargains or finds his money increase in his coffers, thinks presently that he has a good deal of brains and is almost fit to be a statesman.

  Jean de la Bruyere

  Men, Thinking, Brain

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• Present day statesmen are making the biggest blunder of the age if they believe that there can be any peace without equity and justice to all mankind.

  Marcus Garvey

  Believe, Justice, Age

  Marcus Garvey (2015). “Philosophy and Opinions of Marcus Garvey”, p.27, Ravenio Books

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• Pity the nation whose statesman is a fox, whose philosopher is a juggler, and whose art is the art of patching and mimicking. Pity the nation that welcomes its new ruler with trumpetings, and farewells him with hootings, only to welcome another ruler with trumpetings again. Pity the nation whose sages are dumb with years and whose strong men are yet in the cradle. Pity the nation divided into fragments, each fragment deeming itself a nation.

  Khalil Gibran

  Art, Strong, Farewell

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• The key decision for a statesman is whether to commit his nation or not. There is no middle course. Once a great nation commits itself, it must prevail. It will acquire no kudos for translating its inner doubts into hesitation.

  Henry A. Kissinger

  Keys, Government, Decision

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• A statesman wants courage and a statesman wants vision; but believe me, after six months' experience, he wants first, second, third and all the time - patience.

  Stanley Baldwin

  Patience, Time, Believe

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• What is to become of an independent statesman, one who will bow the knee to no idol, who will worship nothing as a divinity but truth, virtue, and his country? I will tell you; he will be regarded more by posterity than those who worship hounds and horses; and although he will not make his own fortune, he will make the fortune of his country.

  John Adams

  Country, Horse, Independent

  John Adams, Charles Francis Adams (1854). “Works: with a life of the author”, p.512

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• The objects of this primary education . . . would be . . . to form the statesmen, legislators and judges, on whom public prosperity and individual happiness are so much to depend.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Education, Individual Happiness, Judging

  Thomas Jefferson (1990). “Public and private papers”, Vintage Books

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• Who but the artist has the power to open man up, to set free the imagination? The others - priest, teacher, saint, statesman, warrior - hold us to the path of history. They keep us chained to the rock, that the vultures may eat out our hearts. It is the artist who has the courage to go against the crowd; he is the unrecognized "hero of our time" - and of all time.

  Henry Miller

  Teacher, Hero, Heart

  Henry Miller (1962). “Stand Still Like the Hummingbird”, p.60, New Directions Publishing

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• We need a government, not politics. Because there's too much politics. Of course there should be debate. But there seems to be so much pettiness and not enough good faith. It is civilized to agree to disagree, and this idea is slowly disintegrating. The great statesmen of the past knew this, and I think it helps drive civilization.

  Daphne Guinness

  Thinking, Past, Civilization

  Interview with Peter Brant II, www.interviewmagazine.com. October 11, 2011.

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• A cold-blooded, calculation, unprincipled, usurper, without a virtue, no statesman, knowing nothing of commerce, political economy, or civil government, and supplying ignorance by bold presumption.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Ignorance, Knowing Nothing, Government

  Thomas Jefferson, Henry Augustine Washington (1859). “The Writings of Thomas Jefferson: Correspondence”, p.352

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• A formative influence on my undergraduate self was the response of a respected elder statesmen of the Oxford Zoology Department when an American visitor had just publicly disproved his favourite theory. The old man strode to the front of the lecture hall, shook the American warmly by the hand and declared in ringing, emotional tones: "My dear fellow, I wish to thank you. I have been wrong these fifteen years." And we clapped our hands red. Can you imagine a Government Minister being cheered in the House of Commons for a similar admission? "Resign, Resign" is a much more likely response!

  Richard Dawkins

  Men, Emotional, Self

  "Science, delusion and the appetite for wonder". www.edge.org. December 21, 1996.

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• The greatest statesmen, philosophers, humanitarians ... have not been able to put an end to war. Why place that demand on photography?

  James Nachtwey

  Photography, War, Demand

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