British Quotes

As a necessary prerequisite to the creation of new forms of expression one might, I suppose, argue that current sensibilities respond uniquely to the notion of exhaustion as exhaustion, although that does de facto seem rather limiting.

Actually, most things I say in public lead more or less directly to my own compositional practice, so I should be careful about generalizing lest they come back to haunt me.

When I left Europe in 1987 I did so with the thought that my relevance as a composition teacher would benefit from a certain cool distance to certain tendencies I had been observing for several years with increasing disquiet.

Sometimes one can be so closely involved with things that the larger context is lost to view.

Here is a place God Almighty can not drive us from.

One does not become a guru by accident.

Imitation, if it is not forgery, is a fine thing. It stems from a generous impulse, and a realistic sense of what can and cannot be done.

The lullaby is the spell whereby the mother attempts to transform herself back from an ogre to a saint.

Zeal without humanity is like a ship without a rudder, liable to be stranded at any moment.

There is no one subsists by himself alone.

There is no belittling worse than to over praise a man.

Meditation is the soul's perspective glass.

Negligence is the rust of the soul, that corrodes through all her best resolves.

Perfection is immutable. But for things imperfect, change is the way to perfect them.

What is true of Mr. Mill's influence on the women's-suffrage question is true also of the other political movements in which he took an active interest.

There is little doubt that the majority of Mr. Mill's supporters in 1865 did not know what his political opinions were, and that they voted for him simply on his reputation as a great thinker.

The assertion of failure coming from such persons does not mean that Mr. Mill failed to promote the practical success of those objects the advocacy of which forms the chief feature of his political writings.

Just as radical heirs apparent are said to lay aside all inconvenient revolutionary opinions when they come to the throne, it was believed that Mr. Mill in Parliament would be an entirely different person from Mr. Mill in his study.

It is almost impossible to imagine that any one could be so insensible to the high morality of Mr. Mill's character as to suggest to him any course of conduct that was not entirely upright and consistent.

If, however, the success of a politician is to be measured by the degree in which he is able personally to influence the course of politics, and attach to himself a school of political thought, then Mr. Mill, in the best meaning of the words, has succeeded.

A large part of the present anxiety to improve the education of girls and women is also due to the conviction that the political disabilities of women will not be maintained.

What he has done for women is final: he gave to their service the best powers of his mind and the best years of his life. His death consecrates the gift: it can never lessen its value.

The first organised opposition by women to women's suffrage in England dates from 1889, when a number of ladies led by Mrs Ward appealed against the proposed extension of the Parliamentary suffrage to women.

The great and the good will decide what is good for us and make sure that we get what is good for us, good and hard.

The banking collapse was caused, more than anything, by bad government policy and the total failure of bad regulation, rather than by greed.

Puppet Papademos is in place, and as Athens caught fire on Sunday night he rather took my breath away - he said violence and destruction have no place in a democratic country.

Perhaps our own opposition to even the level of European integration we have now, let alone any more, is well known.

Minimum sales prices for alcohol are a startlingly bad idea. As with excise duties, the effects are regressive.

Maybe this will be the beginning of a trend? Flat taxes, cutting foreign aid, a referendum on Europe, grammar schools. Who knows?

It's the FSA and its plethora of EU bodies that's failed.