Politics Quotes

"Government is a contrivance of human wisdom to provide for human wants."

"Tell me what are the prevailing sentiments that occupy the minds of your countrymen, and I will tell you what is to be the character of your government."

"All the political agitations of our age tend to resolve into one great problem—Liberty and Authority."

"All government, indeed every human benefit and enjoyment, every virtue, and every prudent act, is founded on compromise and barter."

"Despotism can only exist in darkness, and there is a natural inclination in all despotic governments to shut the eyes of the public understanding."

"The people are the masters of the servants they have appointed."

"Bad laws are the worst sort of tyranny."

"Monarchy is a system by which a nation is governed by a single person."

"All law is coercion; it is force applied in the name of society."

"The state exists only to serve the happiness of its citizens."

"The public good is the only legitimate goal of government."

"The major principle is that no state should be permitted to grow so powerful as to threaten the security of all others."

"A revolution is an idea which has found its bayonets."

"The world is governed by very different personages from what is imagined by those who are not behind the scenes."

"I am most anxious to enlist everyone who can speak or write to join in denouncing this mad, wicked folly of Women's Rights."

"The function of a government is to calm, not to excite the public mind."

"We have no eternal allies and we have no perpetual enemies. Our interests are eternal and perpetual."

"A statesman cannot afford the luxury of private opinion."

"The secret of good government is that it should be almost invisible in the daily life of citizens."

"The foundation of all good government is the confidence of the people."

"Let the Turk now carry away his flag from over Europe, not to Europe but to Asia."

"The political sphere demands both principle and the art of the possible."

"The great question of the time is not one of constitutional politics, but of food and material welfare."

"The great secret of government is to divide mankind into distinct classes."

"The world is governed by very different personages from what is imagined by those not behind the scenes."

"The art of true politics is to perceive the wind and change one's sails."

"Nations are not governed by talk but by understanding."

"In politics, conscience is subordinate to necessity."

"The balance of power is the essence of political security."

"The foundation of all government is law."