Politicians from Australia

"There's no geist like the Zeitgeist."

"No original Gauguins were to be seen in Australia, for post-impressionism was officially thought to be the vulgar effusion of five-thumbed lunatics. (p. 24)"

"If the making of the series had one repeated phrase that still echoes in my head, it was not heard on the soundtrack; the inexorable voice of Lorna Pegram, the producer, muttering: "It's a clever argument, Bob dear, but what are we supposed to be looking at?" (p. 7)"

"In the real world, mice do exist and they generally go about their business whether we see them or not. (p. 17)"

"With hindsight, one can perhaps see that unachievable projects were the right monuments to an ideal. Because they were not built, they could not be destroyed. (p. 92)"

"The essential difference between a sculpture like Andre's Equivalent VIII, 1978, and any that had existed before in the past is that Andre's array of bricks depends not just partly, but entirely, on the museum for its context. A Rodin in a parking lot is still a misplaced Rodin; Andre's bricks in the same place can only be a pile of bricks. (p. 393)"

"If Australia had not been settled as a prison and built by convict labor, it would have been colonized by other means; that was foreordained from the moment of Cook’s landing at Botany Bay in 1770. But it would have taken half a century longer, for Georgian Britain would have found it exceptionally difficult to find settlers crazy or needy enough to go there of their own free will."

"In America, nostalgia for things is apt to set in before they go."

"The desire to be primitive was very much a function of fin-de-siècle imperialism; it appealed to strong egos and domineering minds."

"Far from affording artists continuous inspiration, mass-media sources for art have become a dead end. They have combined with the abstractness of institutional art teaching to produce a fine-arts culture given over to information and not experience. This faithfully echoes the drain of concreteness from modern existence— the reign of mere unassimilated data instead of events that gain meaning by being absorbed into the fabric of imaginative life."

"What strip-mining is to nature, the art market has become to culture."

"Perhaps the rhinos and she-crocodiles whose gyrations between Mortimer's and East Hampton give us our vision of social eminence today are content to entrust their faces to Andy Warhol's mingily cosmetic Polaroidising, but one would bet they would rather go to Sargent."

"It was van Gogh's madness that prevented him from working; the paintings themselves are ineffably sane, if sanity is to be defined in terms of exact judgment of ends and means and the power of visual analysis."

"The sense of not having the whole story that comes from living close up to traumatic events."

"It is the nature of carnivores to get power and then, having disposed of their enemies, to deploy the emollient powers of Great Art to make themselves look like herbivores."

"The hallmark of the minor artist is to be obsessed with style as an end in itself."

"Like most artists who have made an invention of some kind, he tends to overplay the significance of his own and goes on about it as though it were a Rosetta Stone, with whose help all representation can be rescued from one-eyed falsehood."

"New Song rapidly accumulated a nucleus of talent, and its best-known group was Els Setze Jutges, The Sixteen Judges, whose odd-sounding name came from a phrase used as a password by Catalan patriot troops during the rising against and occupation army in 1640 during the Reapers' War: "Setze jutges d'un jutjat menjen fetge d'un penjat" ("Sixteen judges on a tribunal eat the liver of a hanged man"). No lisping Castilian, it was believed, could pronounce this barrage of fricatives."

"Everything that would be said against the Eixample's heirs, from Le Corbusier's 'ville radieuse' to Oscar Niemeyer's Brasilia, was already said, with far less justice, about the Eixample itself. And all its critics concurred that the basic mistake was to have left the planning of a city in the hands of a socialist."

"One thing is sure: the Sagrada Familia is the first Catholic temple whose bacon was ever saved by Shinto tourism. Not even Gaudi, who believed in miracles, could have forseen that."

"It's bad to use words like 'genius' unless you are talking about the late Jean-Michel Basquiat, the black Chatterton of the 80s who, during a picturesque career as sexual hustler, addict and juvenile art-star, made a superficial mark on the cultural surface by folding the conventions of street graffiti into those of art brut before killing himself with an overdose at the age of twenty-seven. The first stage of Basquiat's fate, in the mid-80s, was to be effusively welcomed by an art industry so trivialized by fashion and blinded by money that it couldn't tell a scribble from a Leonardo. Its second stage was to be dropped by the same audience, when the novelty of his work wore off. The third was an attempt at apotheosis four years after his death, with a large retrospective at the Whitney Museum designed to sanitise his short, frantic life and position him as a kind of all-purpose, inflatable martyr-figure, thus restoring the dollar value of his oeuvre in a time of collapsing prices for American contemporary art. One contributor to the catalogue proclaimed that "Jean remains wrapped in the silent purple toga of immortality"; another opined that "he is as close to Goya as American painting has ever produced." A third, not to be outdone, extolled Basquiat's "punishing regime of self-abuse" as part of "the disciplines imposed by the principle of inverse ascetism to which he was so resolutely committed." These disciplines of inverse ascetism, one sees, mean shooting smack until you drop dead."

"I realized that there is nothing whatever outside of the life we have; that the "meaning of life" is nothing other than life itself, obstinately asserting itself against emptiness and nullity."

"We all come into the world with baggage which, in the end, we have no hope of reclaiming, The main item in mine was my father."

"...what has become my frequent prayer since I have had to face death -"Thy holy will, O Lord, not mine be done!""

"How immeasurably fortunate my father was in his faith!"

"But the Japanese paper was what I loved, and now, so many years later, when I see some exquisitely laid piece of calligraphy by a student of Ogata Korin in a museum, I think first not of the spiritualized handwork of Momoyama Japan, but of those long evenings in the family garage with Dad, smoothing and stretching the refined wing coverings of those planes."

"The best thing fishing taught me, I think was how to be alone. Without this ability no writer can really survive or work, and there is a strong relationship between the activity of the fisherman, letting his line down into unknown depths in the hope of catching an unseen prey (which may be worth keeping, or may not) and that of a writer trolling his memory and reflections for unexpected jags and jerks of association."

"Enforced solitude, as in solitary confinement, is a terrible and disorienting punishment, but freely chosen solitude is an immense blessing. To be out of the rattle and clang of quotidian life, to be away from the garbage of other people's amusements and the overflow of their unwanted subjectivities, is the essential escape. Solitude is, beyond question, one of the worlds great gifts and an indispensable aid to creativity, no matter what level that creation may be hatched at."

"Our culture puts enormous emphasis on "socialization", on the supposedly supreme virtues of establishing close relations with others."

"So fishing contributed to an important lesson of my life -how to be alone. I still think solitude is one of the world's great gifts. "Se sei solo," wrote Leonardo da Vinci, "sarai tutto tuo""

"I managed to fail Arts I, a course that a moderately intelligent amoeba could have passed without special coaching."

"...A column is not merely a round stick of stone: it is part of an entire symbolic system, which one cannot intuit simply by looking at it in isolation. The basic reason for studying such things is not merely technical or archivally historical but humanistic; it is to seek out the answer to what someone like Vitruvius meant by his (to us) mysterious comment that "a building should have the proportions of a man,""

"The past is pervasive; it seeps into everything;... And yet because the past is irreplaceable and cannot be done again, it was that very past, not the present or the future, that was so delicate, so vulnerable, so dreadfully easy to erase."

"The truly radical work of art is the one that offers you something to hold on to in the midst of the flux of possibility."

"Some new works of art have values of some kind or another. Others, the majority, have little or none. But newness as such, in art, is never a value."

"The greater the artist, the greater the doubt; perfect confidence is granted to the less talented as a consolation prize."

"Onward onward! must we travel? When will come the goal? Riddle I may not unravel, Cease to vex my soul."

"Question not, but live and labour Till yon goal be won, Helping every feeble neighbour, Seeking help from none; Life is mostly froth and bubble; Two things stand like stone, Kindness in another's trouble, Courage in your own."

"He never gave me a chance to speak, And he call’d her—worse than a dog— The girl stood up with a crimson cheek, And I fell’d him there like a log.I can feel the blow on my knuckles yet— He feels it more on his brow. In a thousand years we shall all forget The things that trouble us now."

"Let me slumber in the hollow where the wattle blossoms wave, With never stone or rail to fence my bed; Should the sturdy station children pull the bush flowers on my grave, I may chance to hear them romping overhead."

"... the wreck of the Batavia provides the greatest dramatic tragedy in Australian history, beside which the Mutiny on the Bounty is an anaemic tale."

"Labor has a universal position of opposition to the death penalty both at home and abroad... It is not possible in our view to be selective in the application of this policy."

"... no diplomatic intervention will ever be made by any government that I lead in support of any individual terrorist's life. We have only indicated in the past, and will maintain a policy in the future, of intervening diplomatically in support of Australian nationals who face capital sentences abroad."

"John Howard's credibility on the entire Iraq war has been torpedoed by John Howard's own intelligence agency."

"Everyone's entitled to their point of view but that's seriously a weird one."

"[But] we should not be kowtowing to anybody when it comes to freedom in this country."

"If he has any self-respect he would resign over this matter, the negligence is so gross."

"This goes to demonstrate the fact that John Howard established this inquiry in order to bring about his own absolution, not to bring about any form of accountability."

"We have seen this complete right wing takeover of modern liberalism, and it is an ugly spectacle to behold."

"When you analyse it carefully, it is about a family’s ability to stay together and have time together. We all know, with our fractured lives in this place, how difficult it becomes when we as human beings cannot spend time with one another. However, the problem is that these industrial relations laws now set that disease in place right across the nation in every workplace, in every part of the country. What I fear most of all is the ultimate impact of this on the fabric of Australian family life."

"Labor’s message then is this: we believe in a strong economy; we believe also in a fair go for all, not just for some."

"I say to those opposite: we intend to prevail in this battle of ideas, on the ground, right through to the next election. We intend to prevail."

"Compassion is not a dirty word. Compassion is not a sign of weakness. In my view, compassion in politics and in public policy is in fact a hallmark of great strength. It is a hallmark of a society which has about it a decency which speaks for itself."

"When it comes to labour market reform, here's the difference between us and John Howard: John Howard regards labour as just like any other economic commodity. We actually see labour as made up of human beings. These are human beings with an intrinsic dignity. When they go to the workplace, they're not just like a lump of wood or a piece of coal, these are human beings, and they should be treated properly as people with intrinsic rights."

"The major challenges of climate change, the major challenge of the economy and manufacturing, the major challenges in education, and how do we turbo-charge our national education system to create the knowledge base for the future of the Australian economy. These are the sorts of areas that you're going to see detailed policy plans from us in the weeks and months ahead..."

"My name is Kevin, I'm from Queensland, and I'm here to help."

"That means temporary borrowings. People have to understand that because there's going to be the usual political shit storm, sorry, political storm."

"It is unlikely that you'll have anything emerge from MEF (Major Economies Forum) by way of detailed programmatic specificity."

"I actually believe in a big Australia - I make no apology for that. I actually think it's good news that our population is growing."

"There's nothing like having a bit of somebody else in you."

"Since ideology matters for Xi Jinping, Rudd’s book [On Xi Jinping] matters for those who want to understand him. The alternative is reading daily Xi’s quite boring prose."

"Adelaide has so little going for it that it should be shut down."

"I was surprised to learn that Adelaide had television."

"I am never going to make another comment about another capital city, I promise you, I promise you that."

"In Australia there are not limits on what you can believe but there are limits on how you can behave. It's called the law, and no one is above it."

"Do you want Australian tax exemptions to be supporting an organisation that coerces its followers into having abortions? Do you want to be supporting an organisation that defrauds, that blackmails, that falsely imprisons? Because on the balance of evidence provided by victims of Scientology you probably are."

"I don't know if I am a very good politician … I'm not a good hater."

"I regularly see constituents, speak to people who feel let down by the justice system quite fundamentally, and these are people who don't make the headlines. These are people who have felt that their sense their grief, their sense of injustice has been compounded by a system that just doesn't work, that just doesn't listen to victims, that effectively disempowers them all too often."

"If the question is do people (in the Liberal Party) believe that human beings are the main cause of the planet warming, then I'd say a majority don't accept that position"

"Mr Rudd's arrogance and vanity in wanting to lead the world in cutting CO2 emissions is really sickening"

"It is literally crazy to be committing to an ETS (emissions trading scheme) before seeing the outcome of Copenhagen . . . and frankly idiotic before we see the final form of the US emissions trading scheme"

"I have said consistently in my 16-and-a-half years in the parliament, I have always supported the party room's decision and the party room is the ultimate authority on these matters. I don't expect that to change."

"Mr Turnbull declined this proposition so I advised that I would have no alternative but to resign from the Shadow Cabinet as I was not able to support the CPRS legislation"

"It is absolutely outrageous that a spin doctor for Labor's NBN Co is being paid $450,000 per annum by Australian taxpayers to promote a company that generates no revenue, has no customers and provides no services to anybody"

"In the race of life, always back self-interest; at least you know it's trying."

"Bruce Hawker was a useful press secretary for a state premier a few years ago before becoming a lobbyist. Right now I am sure he has his hands full helping bail out a sinking Labor government with a recycled Kevin Rudd."

"I'm a media tart. You tell me one politician that's not a media tart, tell me one that's not."

"Prison officers do not have a 'duty of care' to protect prisoners who harm themselves while taking part in illegal behaviour. With regard to needles in prisons, provision of bleach could also be harmful. Bleach is by nature a corrosive agent and could cause serious injury if thrown into the eyes of a prison officer or fellow prisoner, There is evidence that even the highly caustic phenol used to sterilise dental instruments does not eliminate all HIV viruses - only autoclaving in super-heated steam is fully effective. If government provided bleach fails to sterilise prisoners’ illegal needles adequately, does the government become liable for breach of duty of care?"

"Injecting illegal drugs is NOT OK! Prison must be a place where prisoners can detoxify and have the chance to break the habit. This avenue should be addressed, rather than options which reinforce the addictive behaviour."

"South Australian prison officers do have a duty of care to protect inmates from rape and from assault. Provision of condoms would not protect against rape: prisoners with rape or assault tendencies should be separated from other prisoners. So should prisoners with HIV/AIDS."

"Provision of condoms also sends the message that sex between prisoners is OK - yet abstinence is part and parcel of a prison sentence."

"Two of the House of Assembly members, Mr Scalzi and Mr Leggett, basically said that efforts should be made to stamp out drug use, sex and rape in prisons. I think we might as well try to make efforts to try to stop the sun rising, because the evidence we received showed that—it does not matter where you want to go—no other country in the world has been able to stop drug use in prison. If you cannot stop drug use, I doubt very much that you will be able to stop sexual practices, given that the sex drive is probably a little bit stronger than the desire to use drugs."

"Our proposal that the age of consent be reduced is based on the belief that neither the police nor the criminal courts should have the power to intervene in a consenting sexual activity between two young people. It is clearly the case that a number of young people are capable of consenting to sexual activity and already do so."

"Any suggestion that I supported or condoned the vile crimes of child abusers is completely untrue. When Jack Dromey, as NCCL chairman in 1976, vigorously opposed PIE at the NCCL AGM, he did so with the full support of the Executive Committee and myself as general secretary. As the NCCL archives demonstrate, I consistently distinguished between consenting relationships between homosexual men, on the one hand, and the abuse of children on the other. NCCL in the 1970s, along with many others, was naive and wrong to accept PIE's claim to be a 'campaigning and counselling organisation' that 'does not promote unlawful acts'. As General Secretary then, I take responsibility for the mistakes we made. I got it wrong on PIE and I apologise for having done so. I should have urged the Executive Committee to take stronger measures to protect NCCL's integrity from the activities of PIE members and sympathisers and I deeply regret not having done so. ..."

"Feudalism, whatever may be said of it otherwise, was at least based on an personal relationship: capitalism, on the other hand, is a relationship of things. The difference in the two is vast; and the difference in the outlook engendered in the community is also vast."

"With the proper understanding of the economic system, the workers will soon find means to end that system, and to raise on its ruins a development of society having for its goal the benefit of the whole, instead of a part, of the community."

"If we turn back to the time when the first compulsory education act was passed, we find that the capitalists of England fought these acts with all their might, but that they soon withdrew their opposition and supported them. For the employers recognised that though the children would know a little more, the amount could be so restricted that the result would only be to make them better wage slaves, knowing no more of freedom than what we have known and experienced of it."

"One of my missions was to raise the voice of women like me, raise the voice of migrant women and women of colour so it could be part of the political system."

"We are working on a number of fronts (against COVID-19), firstly to make sure that there is support for those Australians and we are also working on, as are other countries, to try to secure their ability to return to Australia."

"Now one of the many lessons from the 2003 Canberra bushfires was the need for early, clear and effective communication with the community on the risks ahead, allowing people to plan and make decisions on whether they'll stay or when they will go."

"I mean—you know—people are entitled to their sexual proclivities, you know, I mean let there be a thousand blossoms bloom as far as I'm concerned, you know—but I ain't spending any time on it because in the meantime, every three months, a person is torn to pieces by a crocodile in North Queensland."

"Treasurer, cannot the Clean Energy Finance Corporation—a development bank ready-to-go—fund industry and infrastructure, Australia builds its way out of the COVID depression—manufacturing, industry, agriculture. North Queensland shovel-ready and COVID-free. Hells Gates, Galilee rail line, CopperString electrification. Not absorb-money but make-money projects, to show you and I are trendy—back in black highway to hell. Um, Treasurer, cough, cough up, the money, make money, make money."

"No, I'm not interested, don't lead me into your rubbish, don't you keep taking us on your flights of fancy. Your city lily pad lefty map mindset."

"The person that prevents us from shooting those crocodiles shall be dragged into a courtroom and held to account for the deaths of North Queenslanders."

"Maybe I know nothing about politics, but if this is getting you votes, I am a Martian astronaut!"

"It seems to me from what I have learned that here in these gentle surroundings have been discovered the true functions of a university and its task of sending out into the world not only men of high educational and cultural standards, but men also of vision, of courage, of honesty and decision."

"For non-believers and believers, I think that a fair amount of people will see it as a great salute to an extraordinary Australian who pioneered education for indigenous people, education more broadly, who did so much to help so many other people."

"It is so much easier to do the job if you're on the ground in Rome. The Vatican is not entirely a closed shop, but you have to know where to look, which conferences to attend, which contacts to pursue."

"For we have here a beautiful land that none could e’er knock down, The brightest jewel that ever was known in dear old George's crown; The brightest jewel that ever was known and never can be a failure. Although the damn Labor party is doing its best to ruin Australia..."

"Bedford could be one of the rudest of men when he chose to exercise his wit at the expense of others. He happened to be a guest at a party given by a lady of some social pretensions. There arrived to it a husband and wife—the wife, big dominant, and masculine, the husband, small, meek, and submissive. Of them, the hostess said to Bedford, ‘Mr Bedford, I want to introduce you to my friends, Mr and Mrs So-and-so.’ Said Bedford, bowing to the couple, ‘Pleased to meet you. Which is which?’"

"As salt as Lot's wife."

"The Governor was a little pink old gentleman; so soft in the skin that he seemed to be stuffed with moss."

"Pretty as a picture and poor as a crow."

"Never was a continent naturally so clean, and made so dirty, as Australia. There was not an animal pest, scarcely a vegetable pest; fools and the old world supplied them all."

"The Bible was second nature; and I had great interest in its gallery of bad men, beloved of the Lord. At least they said they were. Abraham, who represented his wife as his sister, so as to curry favour with Abimelech; Abel the lazy shepherd, who annoyed Cain so that that energetic farmer had to kill him; Noah, who ‘digged a vineyard’ and told tall stories of navigation; Jacob, who refused his brother a meal until Esau signed away his rights; and David, that pious scoundrel, who sent Uriah to death, so that he might steal Bathsheba respectably."

"His moments of most sentimental recollection were when he thought of the beauty of the sausages he had manufactured."

"Half way to Burwood there was a butcher’s shop, run by a Mrs Macnamara. She was a tall woman of great strength, working fiercely and living hard; a living testimonial to the forceful Colonial diet of beef and corn. She handled meataxe and saw as if they were toys. To see her chopping fore and hind quarters of beef fascinated me. I once heard her tell, without boastfulness, but in honest pride, that she was ‘doing six bodies a week’; which is a great tract and wilderness of meat."

"Politics in Australia, as in the rest of the world, are becoming duller and soberer, as the world itself becomes temperate in the use of strong waters. I don’t know the political calibre of the three-bottle men; but it is established, in any constructional thought or action, that, if the man who drinks does silly things sometimes, the teetotaller rarely does anything. Not that the drinking of liquor can make a man clever, but that the instinctive teetotaller lacks genius, although I have known one case of a teetotaller genius. Abraham Lincoln, replying to a puritan critic who said that General Grant drank whisky, wished that he had more whisky-drinking generals if whisky made General Grant do the things he did."

"He had the biggest feet I have ever seen; larger feet even than the feet of that Brisbane man, of whom it was said that two large alligator skins had been sent from Cairns to make a pair of boots for him."

"I read the other day that Hindenberg, waiting to see whether Hitler would secure leadership or not, said, ‘We will see how the cat will jump, with God’s help.’ I presume he meant that God would help him to vision, and not the cat to acrobatics; but one can see how the name of God becomes formula—to be used in every emergency, if only to give the emergency respectability. Hindenberg used the formula in everything. Eighteen months before the war ended, he and Ludendorf knew that they must fail; yet to save face they kept on losing two hundred thousand men a month, and ‘trusting in God.’"

"To-day, a Minister receiving a deputation personally promises ‘consideration of Cabinet’, in a tone that makes the deputation believe it has succeeded. To the wise the old rule persists. If a Government says ‘Yes’, it means ‘Perhaps’; and if it says ‘Perhaps’, it means ‘No’."

"‘I am as happy,’ said he, ‘as a kingk, enchoying himsellef in his harem mit his queens.’"

"There was a bushman serving at Pentridge a sentence for horse stealing. He was a very honest man. He would not think of stealing a penny, but a horse was a different matter."

"He just missed a seat in the Senate; and was sorry because he said he wanted to do a bit for Australia that had done so much for him. And he excused defeat by, ‘I’m that unlucky that if it rained soup, everybody else would have a spoon and I'd be left with a fork.’"

"Big Money is always on the Lord's side."

"It is a quaint fact that the mediocre critic demands, in the one breath, a Parliament representative of all the people, and a Parliament of all the virtues and intelligences. A Parliament of genius would not represent the people, who are emphatically not genius, and Parliaments as they are, with one or two men above the average intelligence, and many men of average intelligence, and more men little better than morons, represents the nation—any nation."

"‘Ah!’ said Wardley, ‘the times are different from my young days. We were independent then; a fair day’s work for a fair day’s pay; that’s all we asked. Here are young fellows today without any sense of independence. My two sons have taken the Old Age Pension.’ ‘How old are they, Bill?’ ‘One’s seventy-four and the other seventy-two! No pride.’"

"The womenfolk of early immigrants to Queensland brought cactus in a pot, because it had a ‘pretty flower’, and the ‘prickly pear’ escaped from the pot and destroyed twenty million acres of the finest land in the State; until the cactoblastis was introduced, and destroyed the pear. An old lady—craving her old-world home—brought sweet briar to South Australia; and it accounted for a few million acres in its turn. A fool pastoralist, whose most coherent phrase was ‘Tally-ho!’ or ‘Yoicks!’ introduced the fox, which has almost wiped out the lyre bird; and another fool introduced the starling. Other pests introduced were Freetraders, sectarianism, water hyacinth and rabbits."

"It is not without design that the monkey with the rainbow stern climbs high. It is the advertisement of his sex appeal, and he doesn't climb far unless there is an audience."

"'I'll never smoke tobacco, It is a filthy weed— I'll never put it in my mouth,' Said little Bobby Reed.'For there is idle Jerry Jones, As lazy as a pig, Who smoked a clay pipe all day long, And thought it made him big.'"

"At the age of five I had begun an association with Temperance Societies; which ended at the age of sixteen—when I discovered the goodness of beer."

"The different men we are in conceit and in humility! Vanity is all the vitamins and all the calories; vanity can keep a man warm in winter without blankets."

"Australia has a word for the s, a word that should be used the world over to describe a killjoy, and that word is ."

"When he falls just short of 'fine writing' his writing is fine."

"Say what they like about Sir Thomas Bent, but he was a man. He mightn’t have much honesty, if there was big money to be got, and he liked his gin and tonic strong an fraquint, an’ a rovin’ eye for wimmen, but outside them matters he was as pure as the drivellin’ snow."

"Parkes said of himself and another member that they were alike in that they consistently lived above their means. He was as much an admirer of the fair sex, so that when once on a specially dashing woman appearing in the gallery of the New South Wales Assembly, and Parkes being asked who she was, replied in sardonic style: "Well I don't know myself. I've asked George Reid and Wise, and they don't know, from which I conclude that she must be a woman of good reputation.""

"Sir Henry Parkes, several times premier of New South Wales, became a father—not for the first time—in his eightieth year. Friends offered their felicitations. ‘Congratulations, Sir Henry, on the birth of your last child,’ said one of them. The old knight snorted. ‘Don’t say my last, you damned fool! Say my latest.’"

"Are you for Light, and trimmed, with oil in place, Or but a Will o’ Wisp on marshy quest? A new demesne for Mammon to infest? Or lurks millennial ’neath your face?"

"And our reward? In this wan land, In clientage of Greed, Despised, polluted, maimed and banned, To wander and—to breed."

"They teach and live the Golden Rule Of Young Democracy:—‘That culture, joy and goodliness Be th’ equal right of all: That Greed no more shall those oppress Who by the wayside fall:‘That each shall share what all men sow: That colour, caste’s a lie: That man is God, however low— Is man, however high.’"

"Ah, Love, the earth is woe’s And sadly helpers needs: And, till its burden goes, Our work is—where it bleeds."

"When, comrades, we thrill to the message of speaker in highway or hall, The voice of the poet is reaching the silenter poet in all: And again, as of old, when the flames are to leap up the turrets of Wrong, Shall the torch of the New Revolution be lit from the words of a Song!"

"This is a rune I ravelled in the still, Arrogant stare of an Australian cow."

"‘Be true, be brave, be merciful, be free!’"

"All that we love in olden lands and lore Was signal of her coming long ago! Bacon foresaw her, Campanella, More, And Plato’s eyes were with her star aglow!"

"Jules Renald has said, "It is not how old you are but how you are old." The way I was old today on my eightieth birthday is that I have just entered the infancy of middle age."

"There is no age more dangerous than old age."

"“If I was the minister for women I would say that I am a feminist, and as the minister for the environment I would certainly say that I am the minister for the environment, so my role in discussions that I have with my colleagues is for the environment,”"

"“I don’t think it matters whether you are on the side promoting your development or preserving conservation, all would agree that the process under EPBC is unnecessarily tied up with green tape and unnecessarily lengthy,”"

"We have a responsibility to the environment and our future to become better at recycling products we use every day."

"Trees are so important to our environment - they cool urban areas, provide shelter & food for native species & absorb loads of carbon."

"Protecting our ocean is good for biodiversity, but also secures the future of sustainable fishing."

"A reminder that healthy oceans are critical to our environment, economy & wellbeing."

"Proud Queen of isles! Thou sittest vast, alone, A host of vassals bending round thy throne: Like some fair swan that skims the silver tide, Her silken cygnets strew'd on every side, So floatest thou, thy Polynesian brood Dispers'd around thee on thy Ocean flood, While ev'ry surge that doth thy bosom lave, Salutes thee "Empress of the Southern Wave.""

"And, oh Britannia! should'st thou cease to ride Despotic Empress of old Ocean's tide;— Should thy tam'd Lion—spent his former might— No longer roar, the terror of the fight:— Should e'er arrive that dark, disastrous hour, When, bow'd by luxury, thou yield'st to pow'r; When thou, no longer freest of the free, To some proud victor bend'st the vanquish'd knee;— May all thy glories in another sphere Relume, and shine more brightly still than here; May this—thy last-born —then arise, To glad thy heart, and greet thy eyes; And float, with flag unfurl'd, A new in another world!"