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7/30/2019 Random Quotations

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of the history books I read seemed to describe a different country [Germany]

from the one a few pages back or the ones that followed.Luigi Barzini: The Impossible Europeans, Weidenfeld & Nicolson 1983.He (William IV) considers it unbecoming this country to show its teeth

without biting, or when it must be considered that it has neither the powernor the intention to bite,

William IV to Lord Grey 1833 quoted in Ph. Ziegler: King William IV.The Queen trusts that no revolutions will ever be thought of in Spain,

for they are a most unjustiable practice unfortunately in fashion in thePensinsula.

Queen Victoria to Lord Palmerston 1846.It is very well for those who have no hard work during the week to go

two or three times to church on Sunday and to remain quiet for the rest of the day, but as regards the working classes the practice is perfect cruelty.ditto, 1856 - (after Parliament had voted against military band perfor-

mances in Kensington Gardens on Sundays).The above from Regina v. Palmerston; Brian Connell 1962.The angels may perhaps be forgiven if rather than tread [themselves] in

those dangerous paths they [prefer to bide their time and] tread upon thefools instead.

Attributed to G. Elton, The Practice of History 1967, by Ph. Singler inthe preface to his Black Death.

It was said of Gladstone that he could convince others of many things andhimself of anything at all. Disraeli could persuade others, but was powerlessover himself.

1. Maurois: Disraeli.

The country, passing at once through an agricultural and a nancialcrisis, was in distress; and like all invalids, it kept turning over, in the hopeof feeling better on the other side.

ibid.Ladies have ts upstairs Notice in a Chinese Dress shop

1. Var: The Maker of Heavenly Trousers.

In foreign politics, things are sometimes what they seem, but rarely whatthey are called.

1. Var The Laughing Diplomat.

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42

Book reviewing is not really an art, but rather a technique comittedto the implausible theory that something worth reading is published eachmorning.

George Steiner.We must make what we can sell, not try to sell what we can make. CBI

Publication, 1986.the Previous examination syndicate reported in February 1918. It

recomended that Latin alone should be a compulsory language with oneother and that there should be a compulsory paper in natural science the proposal for a compulsory science paper was defeated in May 2 . Vic-

toria History of the Counties of England. History of Cambridgeshire VolIII

1959.The irreducible minimum [of undergraduates expenditure on the eve of the Second World War] it was considered, for fees, board, lodging, and

personal expenses would be about 190 per annum with initial expensesof about 45. ibid.

Sweets [are] strange, [such as] the stewed stems of the rhubarb plantwhose medicinical properties are well known; yet these prudish people (theEnglish) openly advertise the defects of their most private internal economyby their shameless partiality for this amazing fare!

Francis Wey: A Frenchman see the English in the Fifties.The French and other continentals have a habit of gargling the mouth;

but it is a custom which no English gentlewoman should, in the slightestdegree, imitate.

Mrs Beetons Book of Household Management 1859-61.Oxford English Dictionary: Anglomania: A mania for what is English,

an excessive admiration of English customs, etc.Gallomania: An unreasoning attachment to France or French customs.

Larousse (1866 Edn)Anglomanie: Admiration exclusive, exagere de tout qui appartient alAngleterre I Gallomanie: Admiration passionnee pour la nation fran-

caise From R. Faber: English & French 1975. 1 5Another English innovation, according to Mrs Trollope, was the intro-

duction of pedestrian pavements in Paris.

ibid. quoting Frances Trollope: Paris and the Parisians 1835.The English poet remained exposed to the danger of identifying Nature

with a garden and of adorning his verses with a herbaceous border.Even as there are Germans who cannot believe that Shakespear was not

a German, so there are Englishman who regard Handel as their compatriot.

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The above from K.V. Stutterheim: Those English! Sijwick 5. Jackson

1937.A Tap Face she looks as though her face was reected in a bathroomtap.

1. Duncombe 1987.

43It is always easier to make an epigram about a man than to understand

him.Aldous Huxley: Grey ninence, 1944.We make our own Amontillado sherry by mixing Tio Pepe and Bristol

Cream.

M.M. Woolfson 1987.when I am dead I hope it may be saidHis sins were scarlet, but his books were read.

1. Belloc.

The Dodo, like ourselves lived on an island; it ate the tropical fruit thatlay on the ground and found its wings superuous and a bore; as a result itgrew so fat that it could not have raised itself off the ground if it had triedand at the rst arrival of man it fell an easy victim. Derek Hudson: TheWay of the Dodo 1941.

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