28 Benjamin Disraeli Quotes on Power

Benjamin Disraeli quotes on power

1. To govern men, you must either excel them in their accomplishments, or despise them.

4. I will sit down now, but the time will come when you will hear me.

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

22. Coalitions though successful have always found this, that their triumph has been brief.

23. This is the third time that, in the course of six years, during which I have had the lead of the Opposition in the House of Commons, I have stormed the Treasury Benches: twice, fruitlessly, the third time with a tin kettle to my tail which rendered the race hopeless. You cannot, therefore, be surprised, that I am a little wearied of these barren victories, which like Alma, Inkerman, and Balaclava, may be glorious but are certainly nothing more.

60. It has been said that the people of this country are deeply interested in the humanitarian and philanthropic considerations involved in [the Eastern Question]. All must appreciate such feelings. But I am mistaken if there be not a yet deeper sentiment on the part of the people of this country, one with which I cannot doubt your lordships will ever sympathise, and that is-the determination to maintain the Empire of England.

65. Which do you believe most likely to enter an insane convention, a body of English gentlemen honoured by the favour of their Sovereign and the confidence of their fellow-subjects, managing your affairs for five years, I hope with prudence, and not altogether without success, or a sophistical rhetorician, inebriated with the exuberance of his own verbosity, and gifted with an egotistical imagination that can at all times command an interminable and inconsistent series of arguments to malign an opponent and to glorify himself?

69. In assuming that peace will be maintained, I assume also that no Great Power would shrink from its responsibilities. If there be a country, for example, one of the most extensive and wealthiest of empires in the world-if that country, from a perverse interpretation of its insular geographical position, turns an indifferent ear to the feelings and the fortunes of Continental Europe, such a course would, I believe, only end in its becoming an object of general plunder. So long as the power and advice of England are felt in the councils of Europe, peace, I believe, will be maintained, and maintained for a long period. Without their presence, war, as has happened before, and too frequently of late, seems to me to be inevitable. I speak on this subject with confidence to the citizens of London, because I know that they are men who are not ashamed of the Empire which their ancestors created; because I know that they are not ashamed of the noblest of human sentiments, now decried by philosophers-the sentiment of patriotism; because I know they will not be beguiled into believing that in maintaining their Empire they may forfeit their liberties. One of the greatest of Romans, when asked what were his politics, replied, Imperium et Libertas. That would not make a bad programme for a British Ministry. It is one from which Her Majesty's advisers do not shrink.

92. In politics, nothing is contemptible.

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

94. I repeat that all power is a trust; that we are accountable for its exercise; that from the people, and for the people all springs, and all must exist.

113. No Government can be long secure without a formidable Opposition. It reduces their supporters to that tractable number which can be managed by the joint influences of fruition and hope. It offers vengeance to the discontented, and distinction to the ambitious; and employs the energies of aspiring spirits, who otherwise may prove traitors in a division or assassins in a debate.

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

142. Mr. Kremlin himself was distinguished for ignorance, for he had only one idea, and that was wrong.

145. Power has only one duty: to secure the social welfare of the People.

151. A majority is always the best repartee.

173. The more you are talked about the less powerful you are.

179. As for our majority... one is enough.

181. Real politics are the possession and distribution of power.

188. A very remarkable people the Zulus: they defeat our generals, they convert our bishops, they have settled the fate of a great European dynasties.

199. I must follow the people. Am I not their leader?

221. The governments of the present day have to deal not merely with other governments, with emperors, kings and ministers, but also with the secret societies which have everywhere their unscrupulous agents, and can at the last moment upset all the governments' plans.

226. The press is not only free, it is powerful. That power is ours. It is the proudest that man can enjoy.

234. We should never lose an occasion. Opportunity is more powerful even than conquerors and prophets.

235. What is crime amongst the multitude, is only vice among the few.

254. The art of governing mankind by deceiving them.

264. The downfall of Beaconfieldism is like the vanishing of some vast magnificent castle in an Italian romance.

266. What strikes me most singular in you is, that you are fonder of Power than of Fame.