The Oxford Dictionary of Quotations Preface

The health of the people is really the foundation upon which all their happiness and all their
powers as a state depend.
Speech, 24 July 1877
Cosmopolitan critics, men who are the friends of every country save their own.
Speech at Guildhall, 9 November 1877, in ‘The Times’ 10 November 1877.
Lord Salisbury and myself have brought you back peace—but a peace I hope with honour.
‘Hansard’ 16 July 1878.
A series of congratulatory regrets.
Referring to Lord Harrington’s Resolution on the Berlin Treaty in a speech at a banquet in The Duke of
Wellington’s Riding School, Knightsbridge, 27 July 1878: ‘The Times’ 29 July 1878
A sophistical rhetorician, inebriated with the exuberance of his own verbosity.
Referring to Gladstone in a speech at a banquet in The Duke of Wellington’s Riding School, Knightsbridge,
27 July 1878: ‘The Times’ 29 July 1878
I admit that there is gossip...that the government of the world is carried on by sovereigns and
statesmen, and not by anonymous paragraph writers...or by the hare-brained chatter of
irresponsible frivolity.
Speech at Guildhall, London, 9 November 1878, in ‘The Times’ 11 November 1878
The key of India is London.
‘Hansard’ 4 March 1881, col. 299
In the ‘Town’ yesterday, I am told ‘some one asked Disraeli, in offering himself for
Marylebone, on what he intended to stand. “On my head,” was the reply.’
Letter, 8 April 1833, in ‘Lord Beaconsfield’s Correspondence with his Sister 1832-1852’ (1886) p. 18
There can be no economy where there is no efficiency.
Address to his Constituents, 1 October 1868, in ‘The Times’ 3 October 1868
No Government can be long secure without a formidable Opposition.
‘Coningsby’ (1844) bk. 2, ch. 1
A government of statesmen or of clerks? Of Humbug or Humdrum?
‘Coningsby’ (1844) bk. 2, ch. 4
Conservatism discards Prescription, shrinks from Principle, disavows Progress; having rejected
all respect for antiquity, it offers no redress for the present, and makes no preparation for the
future.
‘Coningsby’ (1844) bk. 2, ch. 5
‘A sound Conservative government,’ said Taper, musingly.
‘I understand: Tory men and Whig measures.’
‘Coningsby’ (1844) bk. 2, ch. 6
Youth is a blunder; Manhood a struggle; Old Age a regret.
‘Coningsby’ (1844) bk. 3, ch. 1
It seems to me a barren thing this Conservatism—an unhappy cross-breed, the mule of politics
that engenders nothing.
‘Coningsby’ (1844) bk. 3, ch. 5