Statesman Quotes

The opposition is indispensable. A good statesman, like any other sensible human being, always learns more from his opposition than from his fervent supporters.

To be a statesman, you must first get elected.

A politician thinks of the next election. A statesman, of the next generation.

He's passed from rising hope to elder statesman without any intervening period whatsoever.

A disposition to preserve, and an ability to improve, taken together, would be my standard of a statesman.

A statesman, we are told, should follow public opinion. Doubtless, as a coachman follows his horses; having firm hold on the reins and guiding them.

I think it better that in times like these a poet's mouth be silent, for in truth we have no gift to set a statesman right.

The statesman shears the sheep; the politician skins them.

The same contingencies of time and space that force a statesman or soldier to make decisions, impel the historian, though with less urgency, to make up his mind.

A statesman cannot afford to be a moralist.