Quotes About Politics

Government! Well; I suppose there must be government. But the less of it the better. I'm not against government; — nor yet against laws, Mr. Finn; though the less of them, too, the better

What is any public question but a conglomeration of private interests? What is any newspaper article but an expression of the views taken by one side? Truth! it takes an age to ascertain the truth of any question! The idea of Tom Towers talking of public motives and purity of purpose! Why, it wouldn't give him a moment's uneasiness to change his politics to-morrow, if the paper required it.

His wife, who was a year or two older than himself, was a fashionable woman, with thorough Whig tastes and aspirations, such as became the daughter of a great Whig earl; she cared for politics, or thought that she cared for them, more than her husband did; for a month or two previous to her engagement she had been attached to the Court, and had been made to believe that much of the policy of England's rulers depended on the political intrigues of England's women.

As a very young man, Frank Gresham found the life to which he was thus introduced agreeable enough. He consoled himself as best he might for the blue looks with which he was greeted by his own party, and took his revenge by consorting more thoroughly than ever with his political adversaries. Foolishly, like a foolish moth, he flew to the bright light, and, like the moths, of course he burnt his wings.

CHAPTER LXV THE NEW MINISTER

Political enemies are often the best friends in the world; and I can assure you from my own experience that political friends are often the bitterest enemies. I never hated any people so much as some of our supporters.

He was again a member of the British House of Commons, — was again in possession of that privilege for which he had never ceased to sigh since the moment in which he lost it. A drunkard or a gambler may be weaned from his ways, but not a politician.

It is not so in the United States. There the same political enmity exists, but the political enmity produces private hatred.

Mr Moffat was a young man of very large fortune, in Parliament, inclined to business, and in every way recommendable. He was not a man of birth, to be sure; that was to be lamented;

If it had turned out to be anybody else," said the member of Parliament, "the results might have been most serious, — not to say discreditable.

There's nothing of honesty left in politics," said Mr. Bonteen, declaring that he was sick of the life.

The young man's ideas about politics were boyish, but they were the ideas of a clear-headed boy. Silverbridge had picked up some of the ways of the place, though he had not yet formed any sound political opinions

I know nothing whatever about politics," said Lord Chiltern. "I wish you did," said his sister,— "with all my heart." "I never did, — and I never shall, for all your wishing. It's the meanest trade going I think, and I'm sure it's the most dishonest.

CHAPTER XLI THE SENATOR IS BADLY TREATED

Indeed, yes; — or you will be known to all posterity as the fainéant government." "Let me tell you, Lady Glencora, that a fainéant government is not the worst government that England can have. It has been the great fault of our politicians that they have all wanted to do something.

Do something on your own hook. You men in Parliament are so much like sheep! If one jumps at a gap, all go after him, — and then you are penned into lobbies, and then you are fed, and then you are fleeced. I wish I were in Parliament. I'd get up in the middle and make such a speech. You all seem to me to be so much afraid of one another that you don't quite dare to speak out.

I have known gentlemen who have felt that in becoming members of Parliament they had achieved an object for themselves instead of thinking that they had put themselves in the way of achieving something for others. A member of Parliament should feel himself to be the servant of his country, — and like every other servant, he should serve. If this be distasteful to a man he need not go into Parliament

Never within the memory of living politicians had political rancour been so sharp, and the feeling of injury so keen, both on the one side and on the other.

I don't think half so much of Parliament folk as some do. They're for promising everything before they's elected; but not one in twenty of 'em is as good as his word when he gets there.

Then John Morton made up his mind that he would never ask another American Senator to his house.

As Melmotte's supporters began the battle with an attempt at what the Liberals called 'bounce' - to carry the borough with a rush by an overwhelming assertion of the candidate's virtues - the other party was driven to make some inquiries as to that candidate's antecedents. They quickly warmed to the work, and were not less loud in exposing the Satan of speculation, than had been the Conservatives in declaring the commercial Jove.

but men who have been brought up with opinions altogether different, even with different instincts as to politics, who from their mother's milk have been nourished on codes of thought altogether opposed to each other, cannot work together with confidence even though they may desire the same thing. The very ideas which are sweet as honey to the one are bitter as gall to the other.

When any body of statesmen make public asseverations by one or various voices, that there is no discord among them, not a dissentient voice on any subject, people are apt to suppose that they cannot hang together much longer. It is the man who has no peace at home that declares abroad that his wife is an angel. He who lives on comfortable terms with the partner of his troubles can afford to acknowledge the ordinary rubs of life.

This was Mr Optimist, the new chairman, in praise of whose appointment the Daily Jupiter had been so loud, declaring that the present Minister was showing himself superior to all Ministers who had ever gone before him, in giving promotion solely on the score of merit. The