William Pitt and national revival

Champions of the customs of primogeniture must have been disquieted by observing how frequently the mental endowments of the parents were withheld from their eldest son and show...

On 26th April 1773 Pitt’s name was entered at Pembroke Hall, Cambridge; and he commenced residence there on 8th October 1772. His health being ever a matter of grave concern, Wi...

I cannot approve of the requisition, in the studies of future statesmen, of so much theoretical knowledge, by which young people are often ruined before their time, both in mind...

A series of undesigned changes brought the English Constitution to such a condition that satisfaction and impatience, the two great sources of political conduct, were both reaso...

Since the accession of our most gracious sovereign to the throne, we have seen a system of government, which may well be called a reign of experiments.--JUNIUS, Letter to the Du...

In politics, as in war, victories sometimes prove to be more disastrous than defeats. When triumph lures a leader on into ever increasing difficulties, he may well rue his seemi...

Let me lament, With tears as sovereign as the blood of hearts, That thou, my brother, my competitor In top of all design, my mate in empire, Friend and companion in the front of...

When the sixteenth Parliament of Great Britain met on 18th May 1784 the arrears of legislation and accumulation of debt were as serious as at any time in our history; for, owing...

Unblest by Virtue, Government a league Becomes, a circling junto of the great To rob by law; Religion mild, a yoke To tame the stooping soul, a trick of State To mask their rapi...

“We hold ourselves bound to the natives of our Indian territory by the same obligations of duty which bind us to all our other subjects.”--(Proclamation of Queen Victoria, 1st N...

We have the satisfaction of having proposed a system which will not be discredited even by its failure, and we must wait times and seasons for carrying it into effect.--PITT TO...

Some statesmen merit notice solely from the magnitude of their achievements; others attract attention by the charm of their personality. Pitt claims homage on both accounts. Acc...

The situation of Europe appears never to have been so critical at any epoch since the breaking out of the Thirty Years’ War as it is at the present moment.--SIR JAMES HARRIS, _2...

The nation is but the family writ large; and, just as families after a ruinous quarrel sometimes win their way back towards prudence and friendliness, so too nations now and aga...

We have interrupted our survey of Pitt’s foreign policy in order to present a connected account of that interesting episode, the commercial treaty with France. But this event to...

Pitt has already astonished all Europe by the alacrity of the late armament, and his name as a War Minister is now as high as that of his father ever was.--THE EARL OF MORNINGTO...

A Prime Minister of Great Britain needs to be an intellectual Proteus. Besides determining the lines of foreign and domestic policy, he must regulate the movements of a complex...

The causes of insanity are generally obscure. In the case of George III the disease cannot be traced to a progenitor, nor did it descend to his issue, unless the moral perversit...

The more enormous of our offenders might be sent to Tunis, Algiers, and other Mahometan ports, for the redemption of Christian slaves; others might be compelled to dangerous exp...

Slaves cannot breathe in England; if their lungs Receive our air, that moment they are free; They touch our country, and their shackles fall; That’s noble, and bespeaks a nation...

In the spring of the year 1787 the ablest potentate in Europe set out on a State progress to the newly annexed provinces in the South of her Empire. It was carried out with an e...

Holland, partly in order to be free to support the Sultan. Montmorin resolved to thwart the partition of the Turkish Empire and brought pressure to bear upon Kaunitz, who ever l...

We cannot be considered as in any degree bound to support a system of an offensive nature, the great end of which appears to be aggrandisement rather than security.--PITT and th...

I want the trumpet of an angel to proclaim to the ears of sovereigns that it is become their universal interest as well as their moral duty to have a period of peace.--LORD AUCK...

A disposition to preserve, and an ability to improve, taken together, would be my standard of a statesman. Everything else is vulgar in the conception, perilous in the execution...

It is bad economy to tempt an attack, from a state of weakness, and thus by a miserable saving ultimately incur the hazard of a great expense.--PITT, _Speech of 9th February 1790_.

Up to the spring of the year 1791 Pitt had achieved a series of remarkable triumphs in his foreign policy. After lifting his country from the depths of penury and isolation, he...

A pretty piece of work Mr. Pitt has made of this Russian war. I think all the foxhounds will have a fine chase at him next session.--LADY MALMESBURY TO SIR GILBERT ELLIOT, _24th...