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

“Man is not the creature of circumstances, circumstances are the creatures of men.”

“Talk to a man about himself and he will listen for hours”

“Silence is the mother of truth.”

“What we learn from history is that we do not learn from history”

“Patience is a necessary ingredient of genius.”

“Upon the education of the people of this country the fate of this country depends.”

“To believe in the heroic makes heroes.”

“Little things affect little minds”

“Man is only great when he acts from passion.”

“The canter is a cure for every evil.”

“What we anticipate seldom occurs: but what we least expect generally happens.”

“The wisdom of the wise, and the experience of ages, may be preserved by quotations.”

“Justice is truth in action.”

“Success is the child of audacity.”

“If Gladstone fell in the Thames, that would be a misfortune. But if someone fished him out again, that would be a calamity. ”

“You asked me where I generally lived. In my workshop [i.e. in his study] in the mornings and always in the library in the evening. Books are companions even if you don’t open them.”

“Plagiarists, at least, have the merit of preservation”

“There is no education like adversity.”

“Grief is the agony of an instant: the indulgence of grief is the blunder of life. ”

“Read no history--nothing but biography, for that is life without theory.”

“It destroys one's nerves to be amiable every day to the same human being.”

“In politics, nothing is contemptible.”

“It is well-known what a middleman is; he is a man who bamboozles one party and plunders the other.”

“The world is weary of statesmen whom democracy has degraded into politicians.”

“What is earnest is not always true; on the contrary, error is often more earnest than truth.”

“Wherever is found what is called a paternal government, there is found state education. It has been discovered that the best way to insure implicit obedience is to commence tyranny in the nursery.”

“Man is not the creature of circumstances, circumstances are the creatures of men. We are free agents, and man is more powerful than matter.”

“Through perseverance many people win success out of what seemed destined to be certain failure.”

“Every man has a right to be conceited until he is successful.”

“An author who speaks about their own books is almost as bad as a mother who speaks about her own children.”

“Every woman should marry ... and no man.”

“Things must be done by parties, not by persons using parties as tools.”

“I feel a very unusual sensation - if it is not indigestion, I think it must be gratitude.”

“He who gains time gains everything.”

“There is no index of character as sure as the voice.”

“Man is only truly great when he acts from the passions; never irresistible but when he appeals to the imagination.”

“Departures should be sudden.”

“When I want to read a good book, I write one.”

“England is governed not by logic but by parliament.”

“Political life must be taken as you find it.”

“There is no act of treachery or mean-ness of which a political party is not capable; for in politics there is no honour”

“Books are companions even if you don't open them.”

“Justice is truth in action.

“Other men condemned to exile and captivity, if they survive, despair; the man of letters may reckon those days as the sweetest of his life”

“Give a man a fish and he will eat for a day; teach a man to fish and he will eat for a lifetime; give a man religion and he will die praying for a fish.”

“Talk to a man about himself and he will listen for hours.”

“Action may not always bring happiness; but there is no happiness without action.

“I cannot pay attention unless I am attracted," said Egremont.”

“A consistent man believes in destiny; a capricious man in chance.”