“Idleness is only the refuge of weak minds.”
Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield (1694–1773) British statesman and man of letters
20 July 1749
Letters to His Son on the Art of Becoming a Man of the World and a Gentleman (1774)
Quoted from Lal, K. S. (1992). The legacy of Muslim rule in India. New Delhi: Aditya Prakashan.
Travels in the Mogul Empire (1656-1668)
“Idleness is only the refuge of weak minds.”
Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield (1694–1773) British statesman and man of letters
20 July 1749
Letters to His Son on the Art of Becoming a Man of the World and a Gentleman (1774)
Ayman Odeh (1975) Israeli lawyer and member of the Knesset
About the Basic Law: Israel as the Nation-State of the Jewish People, as quoted in Opposition warns of ‘apartheid’ as Knesset starts ‘Jewish state bill’ debates https://www.timesofisrael.com/opposition-warns-of-apartheid-as-knesset-starts-jewish-state-bill-debates/ (26 July 2017) by Marissa Newman, The Times of Israel.
Donald J. Trump (1946) 45th President of the United States of America
Response to a question regarding Michael Wolff's Fire and Fury, Camp David speech https://factba.se/transcript/donald-trump-remarks-questions-camp-david-gop-retreat-january-6-2018 (6 January 2018) <br class="br">2010s, 2018, January
Noam Chomsky (1928) american linguist, philosopher and activist
PBS, March 12, 1998 http://www.pbs.org/newshour/forum/march98/intervention_3-12.html. <br class="br">Quotes 1990s, 1995-1999 <br class="br">Context: The U. S. has always insisted on its right to use force, whatever international law requires, and whatever international institutions decide.… The U. S., of course, is not alone in these practices. Other states commonly act in much the same way, if not constrained by external or internal forces.
Adam Smith (1723–1790) Scottish moral philosopher and political economist
Source: (1776), Book IV, Chapter VII, Part Second, p. 619.
Virginia Woolf book A Room of One's Own
Source: A Room of One's Own (1929), Ch. 1, p. 4
Context: When a subject is highly controversial — and any question about sex is that — one cannot hope to tell the truth. One can only show how one came to hold whatever opinion one does hold. One can only give one's audience the chance of drawing their own conclusions as they observe the limitations, the prejudices, the idiosyncrasies of the speaker.
Dwight D. Eisenhower (1890–1969) American general and politician, 34th president of the United States (in office from 1953 to 1961)
1950s, Second Inaugural Address (1957)
Context: We look upon this shaken Earth, and we declare our firm and fixed purpose — the building of a peace with justice in a world where moral law prevails. The building of such a peace is a bold and solemn purpose. To proclaim it is easy. To serve it will be hard. And to attain it, we must be aware of its full meaning — and ready to pay its full price. We know clearly what we seek, and why. We seek peace, knowing that peace is the climate of freedom. And now, as in no other age, we seek it because we have been warned, by the power of modern weapons, that peace may be the only climate possible for human life itself. Yet this peace we seek cannot be born of fear alone: it must be rooted in the lives of nations. There must be justice, sensed and shared by all peoples, for, without justice the world can know only a tense and unstable truce. There must be law, steadily invoked and respected by all nations, for without law, the world promises only such meager justice as the pity of the strong upon the weak. But the law of which we speak, comprehending the values of freedom, affirms the equality of all nations, great and small. Splendid as can be the blessings of such a peace, high will be its cost: in toil patiently sustained, in help honorably given, in sacrifice calmly borne.
Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, 3rd Marquess of Salisbury (1830–1903) British politician
Statement of an uncredited reviewer in The Quarterly Review [London] (January 1866), p. 277
Misattributed