“Its councils are full of Legislators
no charlatan can fool.”

The First Step http://www.cavafy.com/poems/content.asp?id=145&cat=1
Collected Poems (1992)
Context: Just to be on the first step
should make you happy and proud.
To have come this far is no small achievement:
what you have done is a glorious thing.
Even this first step
is a long way above the ordinary world.
To stand on this step
you must be in your own right
a member of the city of ideas.
And it is a hard, unusual thing
to be enrolled as a citizen of that city.
Its councils are full of Legislators
no charlatan can fool.

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "Its councils are full of Legislators no charlatan can fool." by Constantine P. Cavafy?
Constantine P. Cavafy photo
Constantine P. Cavafy 62
Greek poet 1863–1933

Related quotes

Jane Austen photo

“…if the Legislative Council really ends up with no representatives of industry and commerce, then it is possible that these sectors will comprehensively divest from Hong Kong.”

Gordon Wu (1935) Hong Kong businessman

Original:…如果立法會最終真係無工商界的代表,工商界可以唔同你玩,全面撤資囉。
Source: 胡 應 湘 : 爭 拗 至 2047 都 無 普 選 http://www.hkreporter.com/talks/viewthread.php?tid=870295&page=1

Harold Bloom photo

“I realized early on that the academy and the literary world alike — and I don't think there really is a distinction between the two — are always dominated by fools, knaves, charlatans and bureaucrats.”

Harold Bloom (1930–2019) American literary critic and scholar

Interview in Criticism in Society (1987), edited by Imre Salusinski.

Emil M. Cioran photo
William Paine Lord photo

“All around us there are tangible evidences of the industrial activity of our people and the growth and development of our State, and with national legislation not unfavorable to us, the future of Oregon is full of promise of a rich inheritance to its inhabitants.”

William Paine Lord (1838–1911) American politician

William Paine Lord (1895). Governor William P. Lord - Inaugural Address, 1895 http://records.sos.state.or.us/ORSOSWebDrawer/Recordpdf/6777841. Oregon State Archives, Oregon Secretary of State. Source: Biennial Report of the Secretary of State of the State of Oregon, Messages and Documents, 1895, Vol. 1, Page 1.

Napoleon I of France photo

“A general must be a charlatan.”

Napoleon I of France (1769–1821) French general, First Consul and later Emperor of the French

Napoleon : In His Own Words (1916)

Sinclair Lewis photo
John Ruskin photo

“A little group of wise hearts is better than a wilderness full of fools.”

John Ruskin (1819–1900) English writer and art critic

The Crown of Wild Olive, lecture III: War, section 114 (1866).

Karl Pilkington photo

“If that was on my road the council would be like "Get that down, its a deathtrap!"”

Karl Pilkington (1972) English television personality, social commentator, actor, author and former radio producer

To Ricky and Steve about The Great Pyramids.
An Idiot Abroad

Martin Luther King, Jr. photo

“It is true that behavior cannot be legislated, and legislation cannot make you love me, but legislation can restrain you from lynching me”

Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929–1968) American clergyman, activist, and leader in the American Civil Rights Movement

Speech delivered in Finney Chapel at Oberlin College (22 October 1964), as reported in "When MLK came to Oberlin" by Cindy Leise, The Chronicle-Telegram (21 January 2008)
Variant: It may be true that the law cannot make a man love me, but it can keep him from lynching me, and I think that's pretty important.
Wall Street Journal (13 November 1962), Notable & Quotable , p. 18
1960s
Context: It is true that behavior cannot be legislated, and legislation cannot make you love me, but legislation can restrain you from lynching me, and I think that is kind of important.

Related topics