Quotes About Authority

We councillors think we are men of vision and learning, we gravely delineate our position, set forth our plans and argue our case far into the night. Then some little girl sweeps through and upsets the candle and sets fire to our sleeve; leaves us slapping ourselves like madmen, trying to save our skin.

The role needs honest force and honeyed words, and a certain willingness to obfuscate about the intentions of the King of England: and as Wyatt says that to him nothing is ever clear, and no truth is a single truth, he seems the man for the job.

Listen, Cromwell. You don't get a good name among the lowly by sharing their concerns and handing out coin. You get their respect by overlooking them, as if you did not understand their sort, and your own belly had never been empty.' 'I could not so belie myself.

As a wife she must obey him: women must obey, even queens.

No: these are the complaints of small landowners, and men who don't like to pay their taxes. Men who want to be petty kings in their shires, who want the women to curtsey as they pass through the marketplace. I know these paltry gods, he thinks. We had them in Putney. They have them everywhere.

And I ask you—a woman, weak in body, weak in will—can she rule, with all the frailty of her sex?

I can remember the days,' Mirabeau said, 'when we didn't have public opinion. No one had ever heard of such a thing.

The world is run from Antwerp, from Florence, from places he has never imagined; from Lisbon, from where the ships with sails of silk drift west and are burned up in the sun. Not from castle walls, but from countinghouses, not by the call of the bugle but by the click of the abacus, not by the grate and click of the mechanism of the gun but by the scrape of the pen on the page of the promissory note that pays for the gun and the gunsmith and the powder and shot.

Right is what you can get away with, and wrong is what they whip you for.

Hilary Mantel

Oh, Micheal darling!" "Don't call me darling, I'm a driving instructor!

Even Dad likes it," said Caddy, and her father agreed that he did. In a way. Being a broad-minded, tolerant, artistic sort of person. Or so people told him... "Oh, yes?" said Saffron, rolling her eyes. "Yes," said Bill, sounding a little bit peeved. "So you thank your lucky stars, my girl, because in some families you would have come home to very big trouble! A nose stud! At your age! If you come down with blood poisoning, don't blame me!

Mother," said Janna, "if the Frosches were here first, why do they have the fourth floor? Why did they not take the one we have?" "The Baron arranged it all," her mother said curtly.

Well, I think, by definition, all power has limits.

I believe in delegating power.

People are quick to make monuments of anything they live long enough to control.

The head disappeared, but in a few moments Major Taniguchi emerged from the tent fully clothed and with an army cap on his head. Taut down to my fingertips, I barked out, "Lieutenant Onoda, Sir, reporting for orders.

I stood quite still, waiting for what was to follow. I felt sure Major Taniguchi would come up to me and whisper, "That was so much talk. I will tell you your real orders later." After all, Suzuki was present, and the major could not talk to me confidentially in front of him.

No matter how I tried, I could convince no one of the necessity for guerrilla warfare. They all talked big about committing suicide and giving up their lives for the emperor. Deep down they were hoping and praying that Lubang would not be attacked. I was sure of this, but there was nothing I could do about it. I had so little real authority that they did not even take me seriously.

I had been sent to this island to fight, only to find that the troops I was supposed to lead were a bunch of good-for-nothings, quick to profess their willingness to die, but actually concerned only with their immediate wants. As if this were not enough, I had no authority to issue orders to them. I could only deploy them with the consent of their commander.

You shouldn't rely on others to help you determine what's good and what's bad. In no time at all, you'll simply be under someone else's control.

La moralidad es un servicio doméstico, no una divinidad. Conviene usarla, pero no debe mandar

Nimeni nu pune mare pre? pe faptul c? un preot oarecare se exprim? îin favoarea lui Dumnezeu. Asta-i meseria lui, nu? Dar când matematicieni si oameni de ?tiin?? ca Pasca, Newton ?i Swedenborg fac lucrul ?sta, adep?ii "Tat?lui nostru" devin aten?i.

Hur var det möjligt att han, Martin Birck, som ännu inte hade fyllt sexton år och låg i en liten järnsäng i sina föräldrars hem, kunde tänka annorlunda om de högsta och viktigaste tingen än de gamla och erfarna, och att han kunde ha rätt och de orätt?