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If anybody would make me the greatest king that ever lived, with palaces, and gardens and fine dinners, and wine, and coaches, and beautiful clothes, and hundreds of servants, on condition that I would not read books, I would not be a king.

Thomas B. Macaulay

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More quotes by Thomas B. Macaulay

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Those who compare the age in which their lot has fallen with a golden age which exists only in imagination, may talk of degeneracy and decay but no man who is correctly informed as to the past, will be disposed to take a morose or desponding view of the present.
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Oh, wherefore come ye forth in triumph from the north, With your hands, and your feet, and your raiment all red? And wherefore doth your rout send forth a joyous shout? And whence be the grapes of the wine-press which ye tread?
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Parent of sweetest sounds, yet mute forever.
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The Orientals have another word for accident it is kismet,--fate.
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How it chanced that a man who reasoned on his premises so ably, should assume his premises so foolishly, is one of the great mysteries of human nature.
Thomas B. Macaulay
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With the dead there is no rivalry, with the dead there is no change.
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Was none who would be foremost To lead such dire attack But those behind cried Forward! And those before cried Back!
Thomas B. Macaulay
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Western literature has been more influenced by the Bible than any other book.
Thomas B. Macaulay
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The great cause of revolutions is this, that while nations move onward, constitutions stand still.
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Free trade, one of the greatest blessings which a government can confer on a people, is in almost every country unpopular.
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Both in individuals and in masses violent excitement is always followed by remission, and often by reaction. We are all inclined to depreciate whatever we have overpraised, and, on the other hand, to show undue indulgence where we have shown undue rigor.
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Mere negation, mere Epicurean infidelity, as Lord Bacon most justly observes, has never disturbed the peace of the world. It furnishes no motive for action it inspires no enthusiasm it has no missionaries, no crusades, no martyrs.
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As freedom is the only safeguard of governments, so are order and moderation generally necessary to preserve freedom.
Thomas B. Macaulay
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Knowledge advances by steps, and not by leaps.
Thomas B. Macaulay
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All the walks of literature are infested with mendicants for fame, who attempt to excite our interest by exhibiting all the distortions of their intellects and stripping the covering from all the putrid sores of their feelings.
Thomas B. Macaulay
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Cut off my head, and singular I am, Cut off my tail, and plural I appear Although my middle's left, there's nothing there! What is my head cut off? A sounding sea What is my tail cut off? A rushing river And in their mingling depths I fearless play, Parent of sweetest sounds, yet mute forever.
Thomas B. Macaulay
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A single breaker may recede but the tide is evidently coming in.
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Even Holland and Spain have been positively, though not relatively, advancing.
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Our estimate of a character always depends much on the manner in which that character affects our own interests and passions.
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In the plays of Shakespeare man appears as he is, made up of a crowd of passions which contend for the mastery over him, and govern him in turn.
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