The people are the foundation of the state. If the foundations are firm, the state will be tranquil.
—Classic of History, c. 400 BC
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Quotes
Do good by stealth, and blush to find it fame.
—Alexander Pope, 1738If you read somebody’s diary, you get what you deserve.
—David Sedaris, 2004The gratitude is greater than the gift.
—Pierre Corneille, 1641Democracy produces both heroes and villains, but it differs from a fascist state in that it does not produce a hero who is a villain.
—Margaret Halsey, 1946Democracy, like the human organism, carries within it the seed of its own destruction.
—Veronica Wedgwood, 1946The world is wearied of statesmen whom democracy has degraded into politicians.
—Benjamin Disraeli, 1870The money we have is the means to liberty; that which we pursue is the means to slavery.
—Jean-Jacques Rousseau, c. 1770The first requisite to happiness is that a man be born in a famous city.
—Euripides, c. 415 BCIn politics, what begins in fear usually ends in folly.
—Samuel Taylor Coleridge, 1830I have often said that if I wish to name-drop, I have only to list my ex-friends.
—Norman Podhoretz, 1999Darkness endows the small and ordinary ones among mankind with poetical power.
—Thomas Hardy, 1874Resentment kills a fool, and envy slays the simple.
—Book of Job, c. 600 BC