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Benjamin Disraeli

Benjamin Disraeli Quotes

Former Leader of the House of Commons

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Famous Benjamin Disraeli Quotes

“Had it not been for you, I should have remained what I was when we first met, a prejudiced, narrow-minded being, with contracted sympathies and false knowledge, wasting my life on obsolete trifles, and utterly insensible to the privilege of living in this wondrous age of change and progress.”

ShouldFirstsAgeChangeProgressMetsShould HavePrivilegeTriflesObsoleteWondrousNarrow-mindedInsensible
Book:Delphi Complete Works of Benjamin Disraeli (Illustrated)
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“All of us encounter, at least once in our life, some individual who utters words that make us think forever. There are men whose phrases are oracles; who condense in one sentence the secrets of life; who blurt out an aphorism that forms a character or illustrates an existence.”

ThinkingMenCharacterFormIndividualSecretExistenceForeverOur LivesSentencesPhrasesEncountersAphorismSecret LifeOraclesOne Sentence
Book:Coningsby: Or, The New Generation
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“Without tact you can learn nothing. Tact teaches you when to be silent. Inquirers who are always questioning never learn anything.”

TeachSilentQuestioningTactInquirers
Book:The works of Benjamin Disraeli, earl of Beaconsfield: embracing novels, romances, plays, poems, biography, short stories and great speeches
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“Doubt is an element of criticism, and the tendency of criticism is necessarily skeptical.”

DoubtElementsCriticismTendenciesSkepticismSkeptical
Book:Church policy: a speech delivered by the Right Hon. B. Disraeli, M.P. at a meeting of the Oxford Diocesan Society for the Augmentation of Small Livings, in the Sheldonian Theatre, Oxford, Nov. 25, 1864, etc
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“I was told, continued Egremont, that an impassable gulf divided the Rich from the Poor; I was told that the Privileged and the People formed Two Nations, governed by different laws, influenced by different manners, with no thoughts or sympathies in common; with an innate inability of mutual comprehension.”

PeopleTwoDifferentLawNationsPoorCommonRichMannersMutualDividedPrivilegedInabilityInnateComprehensionTwo Nations
Book:Sybil, Or, The Two Nations
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“You cannot choose between party government and Parliamentary government. I say, you can have no Parliamentary government if you have no party government; and, therefore, when gentlemen denounce party government, they strike at the scheme of government which, in my opinion, has made this country great, and which I hope will keep it great.”

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Author:Benjamin Disraeli
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“You have despoiled churches. You have threatened every corporation and endowment in the country. You have examined into everybodys affairs. You have criticised every profession and vexed every trade. No one is certain of his property, and nobody knows what duties he may have to perform to-morrow. This is the policy of confiscation as compared with that of concurrent endowment.”

KnowsMayCountryCertainChurchPolicyDutyTradePropertyAffairProfessionCorporationsThreatenedNobody KnowsMorrowEndowment
Book:Selected speeches, ed. by T.E. Kebbel
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“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.”

MayLongGovernmentSpiritEnergyNumbersInfluenceOffersProveDebateSecureDistinctionOppositionDivisionAmbitiousSupporterVengeanceJointsDissentTraitorAssassinsFormidableFruition
Book:Collected Edition of the Novels and Tales
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“How very seldom do you encounter in the world a man of great abilities, acquirements, experience, who will unmask his mind, unbutton his brains, and pour forth in careless and picturesque phrase all the results of his studies and observation; his knowledge of men, books, and nature. On the contrary, if a man has by any chance an original idea, he hoards it as if it were old gold; and rather avoids the subject with which he is most conversant, from fear that you may appropriate his best thoughts.”

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Author:Benjamin Disraeli
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“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.”

PoliticsImaginationPoliticianArgumentSeriesCommandAll TimeOpponentsGiftedGlorifyInconsistentEgotisticalExuberance
Book:The Works of Benjamin Disraeli, Earl of Beaconsfield, Embracing Novels, Romances, Plays, Poems, Biography, Short Stories and Great Speeches: Coningsby, v. 2. Selected speeches
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“Posterity will do justice to that unprincipled maniac Gladstone - extraordinary mixture of envy, vindictiveness, hypocrisy and superstition; and with one commanding characteristic - whether Prime Minister or Leader of the Opposition, whether preaching, praying, speechifying or scribbling - never a gentleman.”

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Author:Benjamin Disraeli
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