Quotes & anectdotes from
the wise,
the foolish,
the courageous &
the drunk

Benjamin Disraeli

  • Gender: Male
  • Citizenship: United Kingdom
  • Born: Dec 21, 1804
  • Died: Apr 19, 1881

Benjamin Disraeli, 1st Earl of Beaconsfield, KG, PC, FRS, was a British Conservative politician, writer and aristocrat who twice served as Prime Minister. He played a central role in the creation of the modern Conservative Party, defining its policies and its broad outreach. Disraeli is remembered for his influential voice in world affairs, his political battles with the Liberal leader William Ewart Gladstone, and his one-nation conservatism or "Tory democracy". He made the Conservatives the party most identified with the glory and power of the British Empire. He is, as at 2014, the only British Prime Minister of Jewish birth.

Disraeli was born in London. His father left Judaism after a dispute at his synagogue; young Benjamin became an Anglican at age 12. After several unsuccessful attempts, Disraeli entered the House of Commons in 1837. When the Conservatives gained power in 1841, Disraeli was given no office by the Prime Minister, Sir Robert Peel. In 1846, Peel split the party over his proposal to repeal the Corn Laws, which imposed a tariff on imported grain. Disraeli clashed with Peel in the Commons.

Let the fear of a danger be a spur to prevent it he that fears not, gives advantage to the danger.

Through perseverance many people win success out of what seemed destined to be certain failure.

The more extensive a man's knowledge of what has been done, the greater will be his power of knowing what to do.

Change is inevitable. Change is constant.

Time is precious, but truth is more precious than time.

Where knowledge ends, religion begins.

There is no education like adversity.

A University should be a place of light, of liberty, and of learning.

There is no act of treachery or meanness of which a political party is not capable for in politics there is no honour.

You can tell the strength of a nation by the women behind its men.

Teach us that wealth is not elegance, that profusion is not magnificence, that splendor is not beauty.

The health of the people is really the foundation upon which all their happiness and all their powers as a state depend.

Diligence is the mother of good fortune.

Something unpleasant is coming when men are anxious to tell the truth.

Circumstances are beyond human control, but our conduct is in our own power.

Nurture your minds with great thoughts. To believe in the heroic makes heroes.

To be conscious that you are ignorant of the facts is a great step to knowledge.

Almost everything that is great has been done by youth.

Read no history: nothing but biography, for that is life without theory.

Duty cannot exist without faith.

As a general rule, the most successful man in life is the man who has the best information.

The greatest good you can do for another is not just to share your riches but to reveal to him his own.

Success is the child of audacity.

Justice is truth in action.

Like all great travellers, I have seen more than I remember, and remember more than I have seen.

Never complain and never explain.

Nature, like man, sometimes weeps from gladness.

A Conservative Government is an organized hypocrisy.

Real politics are the possession and distribution of power.

Action may not always bring happiness but there is no happiness without action.

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

I am prepared for the worst, but hope for the best.

There is no waste of time in life like that of making explanations.

A majority is always better than the best repartee.

The secret of success is to be ready when your opportunity comes.

Great countries are those that produce great people.

The pursuit of science leads only to the insoluble.

That fatal drollery called a representative government.

It destroys one's nerves to be amiable every day to the same human being.

Characters do not change. Opinions alter, but characters are only developed.

We cannot learn men from books.

In a progressive country change is constant change is inevitable.

I say that justice is truth in action.

Assassination has never changed the history of the world.

Courage is fire, and bullying is smoke.

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

You will find as you grow older that courage is the rarest of all qualities to be found in public life.

One secret of success in life is for a man to be ready for his opportunity when it comes.

The secret of success is constancy to purpose.

Experience is the child of thought, and thought is the child of action.

Youth is the trustee of prosperity.

Fear makes us feel our humanity.

The practice of politics in the East may be defined by one word: dissimulation.

What is earnest is not always true on the contrary, error is often more earnest than truth.

War is never a solution it is an aggravation.

The first magic of love is our ignorance that it can ever end.

Youth is a blunder Manhood a struggle, Old Age a regret.

Seeing much, suffering much, and studying much, are the three pillars of learning.

The view of Jerusalem is the history of the world it is more, it is the history of earth and of heaven.

Taking a new step, uttering a new word, is what people fear most.

No man is regular in his attendance at the House of Commons until he is married.

Never apologize for showing feeling. When you do so, you apologize for the truth.

Man is only great when he acts from passion.

Upon the education of the people of this country the fate of this country depends.

Silence is the mother of truth.

Finality is not the language of politics.

The wisdom of the wise and the experience of the ages are perpetuated by quotations.

Travel teaches toleration.

There is no gambling like politics.

No Government can be long secure without a formidable Opposition.

Beware of endeavoring to become a great man in a hurry. One such attempt in ten thousand may succeed. These are fearful odds.

We are all born for love. It is the principle of existence, and its only end.

The secret of success in life is for a man to be ready for his opportunity when it comes.

In politics nothing is contemptible.

The services in wartime are fit only for desperadoes, but in peace are only fit for fools.