The author says one patrician English leader saw his relationship with the populace thusly: He wasn't responsible TO them. He was responsible FOR them. He was responsible for their care.

Everything interested him and everything excited him.

William McKinley was a man made to be managed.

What other country has had the privilege of making the world's heart beat faster?

Diplomacy's primary law: LEAVE ROOM FOR NEGOTIATION.

The art of oratory was considered part of the equipment of a statesman.

A minister's (cabinet member's) function was not to DO the work but to see that it got done.

Duty was not untinged by ambition.

Britain had an air of careless supremacy which GALLED her neighbors.

Even his own speeches bored him.

He had been present in their minds not as a man but as an idea.

Power and control are more dangerous than any weapons.

Halloween creatures both friendly & gruesome peered out of the rustling leaves.

It was great. I mean, it's a blast directing underwater stuff.

How can we be isolating ourselves when it's 16 to 3 in NATO for what we want to do?

Going without food or water will kill the body, but the lack of relationship will kill the mind and spirit.

If certain critics and poetasters had their way, 'Ordinary Piety' and its child, Dullness, would be the masters of poetry.

I am receiving what I suppose to be the usual number of threatening letters on the subject. Assassination can be no more guarded against than death by lightning; it is best not to worry about either.

I'm still not a very good white wine, but I'm drinkable - you could put me in a punch, anyway.

A really good stand-up comic is a poet; it's about the use of language. It can be really poetic. And I like politically conscious comedy.

Communication is something so simple and difficult that we can never put it in simple words.