"It is not a reproach but a compliment to learning, to say, that great scholars are less fit for business; since the truth is, business is so much a lower thing than learning, that a man used to the last cannot easily bring his stomach down to the first."

George Savile Politics See all quotes by George Savile →

React to this quote

More by George Savile

“A Man who is Master of Patience, is Master of everything else.”

“When the People contend for their Liberty, they seldom get any thing by their Victory but new Masters.”

“A man that should call every thing by its right Name, would hardly pass the Streets without being knock'd down as a common Enemy.”

“Half the Truth is often as arrant a Lye, as can be made.”

“Anger is never without an Argument, but seldom with a good one.”

“The best way to suppose what may come, is to remember what is past.”

Resonant Thoughts

"The only time they tell the truth is when they admit that they are lying."

— Ron Paul

Medicine1935

#truth

"There is a danger that we legislate to feel good, not to do good. Nowhere is this truer than in social legislation. The warm glow comes quickly after passing a piece of law which is designed to raise …"

— Douglas Hurd

Politics1930

#truth

"It is madness to attempt to hold. In the first place the troops cannot do it and in the second place if they do not retreat they will be destroyed. I repeat that this order be rescinded or that you fi…"

— Gerd von Rundstedt

Military1875–1953

#youth

"When authoritarianism is no longer necessary to protect the welfare of the people, I will be the first to move for its dismantling. But the easy, casual wave of the hand dismissing the dangers that co…"

— Ferdinand Marcos

Politics1917–1989

#writing