Top 248 Statesman Quotes & Sayings

My view of Magneto is that he's the terrorist who might someday evolve into a statesman.

The successful revolutionary is a statesman, the unsuccessful one a criminal.

We got a copy of the 'New Statesman' at my grammar school in Wigton, Cumbria, in the 1950s. It sat mint fresh every week on the library table, with two or three other bargain-offer magazines. The 'Statesman' came out of the unimaginable Great World. I started to read it then and have pegged along ever since.

Man is priest, and scholar, and statesman, and producer, and soldier.

He is almost a statesman. He lies well.

The difference between being an elder statesman And posing successfully as an elder statesman Is practically negligible.

The statesman shears the sheep; the politician skins them.

A politician thinks of the next election; a statement of the next generation. A politician looks for the success of his party; a statesman for that of his country. The statesman wishes to steer, while the politician is satisfied to drift.

Now I know what a statesman is; he's a dead politician. We need more statesmen.

A great statesman is he who knows when to depart from traditions, as well as when to adhere to them.

A statesman's words, like butcher's meat, should be well weighed.

The statesman must think in terms of the national interest, conceived as power among other powers. The popular mind, unaware of the fine distinctions of the statesman's thinking, reasons more often than not in the simple moralistic and legalistic terms of absolute good and absolute evil.

Nobody is qualified to become a statesman who is entirely ignorant of the problem of wheat.

A great statesman, like a good housekeeper, knows that cleaning has to be done every morning.

The dignity of man is vindicated as much by the thinker and poet as by the statesman and soldier.

You know, a statesman is a dead politician.

A statesman is any politician it's considered safe to name a school after.

A statesman who shakes the fruit trees of his neighbors - to dislodge the worms.

War is the statesman's game, the priest's delight, the lawyer's jest, the hired assassin's trade.

A statesman is a politician who places himself at the service of the nation. A politician is a statesman who places the nation at his service.

A witty statesman said, you might prove anything by figures.

Many shining actions owe their success to chance, though the general or statesman receive the applause.

The difference between a politician and a statesman is that a politician thinks about the next election while the statesman think about the next generation

In our country and in our times no man is worthy the honored name of statesman who does not include the highest practicable education of the people in all his plans of administration. He may have eloquence, he may have a knowledge of all history, diplomacy, jurisprudence; and by these he might claim, in other countries, the elevated rank of a statesman: but unless he speaks, plans, labors, at all times and in all places, for the culture and edification of the whole people, he is not, he cannot be, an American statesman.

I definitely get the sense that I'm an elder statesman, but I don't know if there's an impact - and I'm not saying that in a naïve way. I don't know. I think anybody who's been doing it for 25 years is going to be considered an elder statesman. But I don't know if I've impacted anyone.

Statesman create; ordinary leaders consume. The ordinary leader is satisfied with ameliorating the environment, not transforming it; a statesman must be a visionary and an educator.

There's a certain clubbiness to the idea that you're an ex-president. You're no longer a politician. You're a statesman.

A statesman is a successful politician who is dead.

A statesman cannot afford to be a moralist.

ARENA, n. In politics, an imaginary rat-pit in which the statesman wrestles with his record.

The first requirement of a statesman is that he be dull.

Statesman only talk of fate when they have blundered

The role of the scholar is to destroy chimeras, that of the statesman is to make use of them.

The true statesman is the one who is willing to take risks.

The National defense is one of the cardinal duties of a statesman.

To delight in war is a merit in the soldier, a dangerous quality in the captain, and a positive crime in the statesman.

A politician is a statesman who approaches every question with an open mouth.

Now he is a statesman, when what he really wants is to be what most reporters are, adult delinquents.

A politician before he can become a statesman has to remain in office long enough.

The statesman cannot govern without stability of belief, true or false.

He never sought to stem the current. [Of a statesman who accommodates his views to public opinion.]

It is neither the statesman nor the friend who is asking your help and assistance, but simply the man.

He's passed from rising hope to elder statesman without any intervening period whatsoever.

Nelson Mandela is, for me, the single statesman in the world. The single statesman, in that literal sense, who is not solving all his problems with guns. It's truly unbelievable.

Richelieu was a great statesman, and like all great statesman, he was a very ruthless man. He's not cruel. He just does what he has to do. And in his own mind, he's absolutely right.

A statesman wants courage and a statesman wants vision; but believe me, after six months' experience, he wants first, second, third and all the time - patience.

The care of the public health is the first duty of the statesman.

The fastest way for a politician to become an elder statesman is to lose an election.

Henry Kissinger is perhaps the best-known American statesman of the 20th century.

When you're out of office, you can be a statesman.

A disposition to preserve, and an ability to improve, taken together, would be my standard of a statesman.

A constitutional statesman is in general a man of common opinions and uncommon abilities.

The less a statesman amounts to, the more he loves the flag.

To be a statesman, you must first get elected.

MULTITUDE, n. A crowd; the source of political wisdom and virtue. In a republic, the object of the statesman's adoration.

That is Gladstone, the greatest statesman that ever lived. I intend to be a statesman, too.

The legislator must be in advance of his age. Across the mind of the statesman flash ever and anon the brilliant, though partial, intimations of future events.... Something which is more than fore-sight and less than prophetic knowledge marks the statesman a peculiar being among his contemporaries.

It would be a serious mistake to replace a seasoned statesman with a tempermental tycoon who has no respect for the constitution.

The heart of a statesman should be in his head.

At home, you always have to be a politician; when you're abroad, you almost feel yourself a statesman.