Statesmen Quotes - Page 9

• The man of large and conspicuous public service in civil life must be content without the Presidency. Still more, the availability of a popular man in a doubtful State will secure him the prize in a close contest against the first statesman of the country whose State is safe.

  Rutherford B. Hayes

  Country, Men, Availability

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• Those great and glorious actions that dazzle our eyes with their luster are represented by statesmen as the result of great wisdomand excellent design; whereas, in truth, they are commonly the effects of the humors and passions.

  Francois de La Rochefoucauld

  Passion, Eye, Design

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• National defense is one of the cardinal duties of a statesman, and that there is an obligation to perform such a duty absolutely irrespective of party politics or factional differences.

  John Adams

  Party, Differences, Voting

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• Statesmen are grocers, ambitious clowns.

  Dejan Stojanovic

  Ambition, Ambitious, Clown

  "The Sun Watches the Sun" by Dejan Stojanovic, Sunce sebe gleda, Književna reč, Beograd, "Game III," (p. 98), 1999.

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• We electors have an important constitutional power placed in our hands: we have a check upon two branches of the legislature, as each branch has upon the other two; the power I mean of electing at stated periods, one branch, which branch has the power of electing another. It becomes necessary to every subject then, to be in some degree a statesman: and to examine and judge for himself of the tendencies of political principles and measures.

  John Adams

  Mean, Hands, Two

  John Adams, Charles Francis Adams (1851). “The Works of John Adams, Second President of the United States: With a Life of the Author, Notes and Illustrations”, p.437

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• Wine has been with us since the beginning of civilization. It is the temperate, civilized, sacred, romantic mealtime beverage recommended in the Bible. Wine has been praised for centuries by statesmen, philosophers, poets, and scholars. Wine in moderation is an integral part of our culture, heritage and gracious way of life.

  Robert Mondavi

  Wine, Civilization, Culture

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• I have been told that one of the reasons the astronomers of the world cooperate is the fact that there is no one nation from which the entire sphere of the sky can be seen. Perhaps there is in that fact a parable for national statesmen, whose political horizons are all too often limited by national horizons.

  Adlai Stevenson I

  Sky, Astrology, Political

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• The National defense is one of the cardinal duties of a statesman.

  John Adams

  Defense, Cardinals, Duty

  "The military policy of the United States". Book by Emory Upton, 1912.

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• People are now starting to explain the Cold War. Even in the crises at that time the survival of millions of people was at stake. And we (the USA) had to threaten the other super power with retaliation to prevent it from doing something to us. Today we live in a world in which a lot of things are in flux. That creates a lot of fear. But it is also a time of great opportunity. And I would call on today's statesmen to not allow their thinking to be directed by fear.

  Henry A. Kissinger

  War, Opportunity, Thinking

  Source: www.spiegel.de

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• Statesmen think in terms of history and view society as an organism. Prophets are different since they believe absolute aims can be achieved in the foreseeable future. More people have been killed by crusaders than by statesmen.

  Henry A. Kissinger

  Believe, Thinking, Views

  Source: www.spiegel.de

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• Art is always the index of social vitality, the moving finger that records the destiny of a civilization. A wise statesman should keep an anxious eye on this graph, for it is more significant than a decline in exports or a fall in the value of a nation's currency.

  Herbert Read

  Wise, Art, Fall

  Herbert Read (2002). “To Hell with Culture: And Other Essays on Art and Society”, p.28, Psychology Press

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• Who, born for the universe, narrow'd his mind, And to party gave up what was meant for mankind; Though fraught with all learning, yet straining his throat To persuade Tommy Townshend to lend him a vote. Who too deep for his hearers still went on refining, And thought of convincing while they thought of dining: Though equal to all things, for all things unfit; Too nice for a statesman, too proud for a wit.

  Oliver Goldsmith

  Nice, Party, Learning

  'Retaliation' (1774) l. 29 (on Edmund Burke)

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• The republic which sinks to sleep, trusting to constitutions and machinery, to politicians and statesmen, for the safety of its liberties, never will have any.

  Wendell Phillips

  Sleep, Safety, Democracy

  Wendell Phillips (1902). “Selections from the works of Wendell Phillips”

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• For I must not measure the speech of a statesman to his people by the impression which it leaves in a university professor, but by the effect it exerts on the people. And this alone gives the standard for the speaker's genius.

  Adolf Hitler

  University Professors, Media, People

  Adolf Hitler (1998). “Mein Kampf”, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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• But a good patriot, and a true politician, always considers how he shall make the most of the existing materials of his country. A disposition, to preserve, and an ability to improve, taken together, would be my standard of a statesman. Everything else is vulgar in the conception, perilous in the execution.

  Edmund Burke

  Country, Taken, Together

  Edmund Burke (1852). “The Works and Correspondance of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke”, p.280

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• Great Socialist statesmen aren't made, they're still-born.

  Hector Hugh Munro

  Communism, Born, Made

  Saki, Hector Hugh Munro (2016). “Delphi Complete Works of Saki (Illustrated)”, p.97, Delphi Classics

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• The president said nothing about the views of government in regard to the possibility of Carolinas seceding. This however was frequently spoken of by other statesmen at the North. I think they were unanimous in this, that no army would be sent here.

  John Bachman

  Army, Thinking, Government

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• We all strive for safety, prosperity, comfort, long life, and dullness. The deer strives with his supple legs, the cowman with trap and poison, the statesman with pen, the most of us with machines, votes, and dollars. A measure of success in this is all well enough, and perhaps is a requisite to objective thinking, but too much safety seems to yield only danger in the long run. Perhaps this is behind Thoreau's dictum: In wilderness is the salvation of the world. Perhaps this is the hidden meaning in the howl of the wolf, long known among mountains, but seldom perceived among men.

  Aldo Leopold

  Life, Running, Men

  "A Sand County Almanac: And Sketches Here and There". Book by Aldo Leopold. Chapter "Arizona and New Mexico: Thinking Like a Mountain", p. 133, 1949.

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• Repetita iuvant. Italy, a land of great saints, poets, sailors, artists, statesmen, businessmen, lawyers, intellectuals, professors, journalists, whores, gangsters, religious parasites and dickheads.

  William C. Brown

  Religious, Artist, Land

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• And when statesman or others worry [the scientist] too much, then he should leave with his possessions.

  Tycho Brahe

  Worry, Too Much, Scientist

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• It is neither the statesman nor the friend who is asking your help and assistance, but simply the man.

  Pierre Laval

  Men, Asking, Helping

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• A great statesman is he who knows when to depart from traditions, as well as when to adhere to them.

  John Stuart Mill

  Tradition, Wells, Knows

  John Stuart Mill (2015). “On Liberty, Utilitarianism and Other Essays”, p.239, OUP Oxford

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• Routine is the god of every social system; it is the seventh heaven of business, the essential component in the success of every factory, the ideal of every statesman. The social machine should run like clockwork.

  Alfred North Whitehead

  Running, Heaven, Essentials

  Alfred North Whitehead (1967). “Adventures of Ideas”, p.90, Simon and Schuster

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• Perhaps one day, all these conflicts will end, and it won't be because of great statesmen or churches or organisations like this one. It'll be because people have changed. They'll be like you, Puffin. More a mixture. So why not become a mongrel? It's healthy.

  Kazuo Ishiguro

  People, Healthy, Church

  Kazuo Ishiguro (2001). “When We Were Orphans”, p.95, Vintage

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• The first requirement of a statesman is that he be dull.

  Dean Acheson

  Dull, Politics, Requirements

  In Observer 21 June 1970

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