taoisigh

"The greatest nation and most powerful nation on Earth."

"The outstanding organiser who brought Lenin himself to Ireland to see how the National Loan worked."

"Whether it's in relation to the sort of music that is played there or not, in any event, it's tragic for the families involved here."

"Is [assassination] only justified if the target is a reactionary, anti-democratic, anti-human rights obscurantist like bin Laden?"

"Bejaysus, I wish I didn't have to go back and face what I have to face."

"If there's anyone out there who still doubts that Ireland is a place where all things are possible, who still wonders if the dream of our ancestors is alive in our time, who still questions our capacity to restore ourselves, reinvent ourselves and prosper, today is your answer."

"So I say to those people. And God knows we have some All-Ireland champions here in Castlebar. I don't mean Castlebar Mitchels, I mean the whingers that I hear every week."

"Generally when people speak to each other they use words."

"You could do with a day's work, I'd say."

"The incoming government is not going to leave our people in the dark. likes to know what the story is."

"The fact is that I used the word, and no context can excuse it. I failed to exemplify my own standards and those of my party. I apologise for any offence this may have caused, particularly to the Lumumba family."

"Some nigger who died dans la guerre."

"I thought he was honest. He looked like someone who wasn't going to tell a lie."

"The dull man of Irish politics."

"' I was reared in a pub – as a young fellow, serving in the pub I learnt far more there about human nature than I learnt in any university or school. I think it gave me a great insight into people."

"I think it is fair to say that 2007 represents a turning point for the Irish economy."

"However, we must not lose sight of the fact that the fundamentals of the economy are still good."

"Yeah, well, there's a mirror in the toilet if you want to go in there and talk to them."

"We need to get a handle on this, will you ring those fuckers."

"Hopefully that will be seen as a response, a leadership responding to an issue and therefore one's authority, while it's not as high if you didn't have the problem, it does mean that people say 'well he used his authority to come up with a solution in double-quick time that met with broader public acceptance."

"We have seen already how resistant public opinion is, firstly to comprehension of the new paradigm in which we have to operate; and secondly, to the rationale behind the decisions we have had to take."

"That deterioration, if you like, has to be addressed in the context of the Government being prepared to look at further programmes to see what way we can ensure that going into next year, as challenging as it may be, to see in what way we can seek to help stabilise the finances further."

"As long as I am running this Government I will run the Government as I see fit...as I believe in, based on my philosophy."

"I believe it is the best method to get the buy-in for the road we have to travel. I believe it is a problem-solving process about how we collectively come forward with a strategy to deal with the issue."

"I've come up through the ranks of this parliamentary party and let me tell you the principles that have guided me on that journey since my first election 25 years ago: Loyalty to the party, service to our country and a determination to always do my best for the people. They are principles that still guide me."

"There were a couple of occasions when it was passed around – and, unlike President Clinton, I did inhale!."

"It's guarded by units of the British army and I can never come up to this border without experiencing deep feelings of anger and resentment."

"I could instance a load of fuckers whose throats I'd cut and push over a cliff."

"The best, the most skillful, the most devious and the most cunning."

"As a community we are living way beyond our means"

"You know, I have a theory about Charlie Haughey. If you give him enough rope, he'll hang you."

"He (Haughey) was a very promising minister in the '60s, but once he became leader all he was concerned with was staying leader. It was always about the cult of leadership. His sense of himself was much more important than any vision he had for the country. People say he discovered fiscal rectitude in '87, and people talk about his contribution to Anglo-Irish affairs, but really if you try and look for any consistency in his affairs after the late '70s you can't find it because it's just about him."

"Charles Haughey was undoubtedly a great statesman...By far the most gifted politician of his generation, he squandered his opportunities for greatness on luxuriant rhetoric and luxurious living."

"He can only be defined by his contradictions: a patriot whose ultimate allegiance was not to Ireland but to the Cayman Islands; a preacher of family values who kept an expensive mistress; a lover of power who allowed himself to become a kept man; a product of the Catholic lower middle class who spent millions of pounds of other people's money in affecting the style of an Ascendancy gent; a man of the people who secretly sniggered at the people's credulity; a charmer who liked to cultivate an air of menace and warned his own bank that he could be a very troublesome adversary."

"It was a bizarre happening, an unprecedented situation, a grotesque situation, an almost unbelievable mischance."

"It must be clear to you, Mr. President, from the reception you received everywhere, the deep affection with which you are held here in America--your second home. You are at once a legend and a warm friend. Your public career encompasses the history of modern Ireland to such an extent that you are not only its leading representative; you are also its personification, with all the pride, charm, courage and understanding that are associated with Ireland and its people. Under your wise leadership, Ireland not only regained her freedom and independence; it has become a distinguished member of the community of nations, dedicated to the causes of independence, freedom and peace."

"The ideal Ireland that we would have, the Ireland that we dreamed of, would be the home of a people who valued material wealth only as a basis for right living, of a people who, satisfied with frugal comfort, devoted their leisure to the things of the spirit – a land whose countryside would be bright with cosy homesteads, whose fields and villages would be joyous with the sounds of industry, with the romping of sturdy children, the contest of athletic youths and the laughter of happy maidens, whose firesides would be forums for the wisdom of serene old age. The home, in short, of a people living the life that God desires that men should live. With the tidings that make such an Ireland possible, St. Patrick came to our ancestors fifteen hundred years ago promising happiness here no less than happiness hereafter. It was the pursuit of such an Ireland that later made our country worthy to be called the island of saints and scholars. It was the idea of such an Ireland - happy, vigorous, spiritual - that fired the imagination of our poets; that made successive generations of patriotic men give their lives to win religious and political liberty; and that will urge men in our own and future generations to die, if need be, so that these liberties may be preserved. One hundred years ago, the Young Irelanders, by holding up the vision of such an Ireland before the people, inspired and moved them spiritually as our people had hardly been moved since the Golden Age of Irish civilisation. Fifty years later, the founders of the Gaelic League similarly inspired and moved the people of their day. So, later, did the leaders of the Irish Volunteers. We of this time, if we have the will and active enthusiasm, have the opportunity to inspire and move our generation in like manner. We can do so by keeping this thought of a noble future for our country constantly before our eyes, ever seeking in action to bring that future into being, and ever remembering that it is for our nation as a whole that future must be sought."

"It is my considered opinion that in the fullness of time history will record the greatness of Michael Collins and it will be recorded at my expense."

"When Christianity was brought to her shores it was received with a joy and eagerness, and held with a tenacity of which there is hardly such another example."

"Next to her services to religion, Ireland's greatest contribution to the welfare of humanity has been the example of devotion to freedom which she has given throughout seven hundred years."

"Ireland has produced in Dean Swift perhaps the greatest satirist in the English language; in Edmund Burke probably the greatest writer on politics; in William Carleton a novelist of the first rank; in Oliver Goldsmith a poet of rare merit. Henry Grattan was one of the most eloquent orators of his time—the golden age of oratory in the English language. Theobald Wolfe Tone has left us one of the most delightful autobiographies in literature. Several recent or still living Irish novelists and poets have produced work which is likely to stand the test of time."

"Ireland's music is of a singular beauty. Based on pentatonic scale its melodies reach back to a period anterior to the dawn of musical history. It stands pre-eminent amongst the music of the Celtic nations. It is characterised by perfection of form and variety of melodic content. It is particularly rich in tunes that imply exquisite sensitiveness. The strange fitfulness of the lamentations and love songs, the transition from gladness to pathos, have thrilled the experts, and made them proclaim our music the most varied and the most poetical in the world. Equal in rhythmic variety are our dance tunes—spirited and energetic in keeping with the temperament of our people."

"The Irish genius has always stressed spiritual and intellectual rather than material values."

"In this day, if Ireland is faithful to her mission, and, please God, she will be, if as of old she recalls men to forgotten truths, if she places before them the ideals of justice, of order, of freedom rightly used, of Christian brotherhood—then, indeed, she can do the world a service as great as that which she rendered in the time of Columcille and Columbanus, because the need of our time is in no wise less."

"No matter what the future may hold for the Irish nation, the seven years — 1916 to 1923 — must ever remain a period of absorbing interest. Not for over two hundred years has there been such a period of intense and sustained effort to regain the national sovereignty and independence. Over the greater part of the period it was the effort of, one might say, the entire nation. An overwhelming majority of the people of this island combined voluntarily during those years in pursuit of a common purpose."

"Nature never intended me to be a partisan leader … Every instinct of mine would indicate that I was meant to be a dyed-in-the-wool Tory, or even a bishop, rather than the leader of a revolution."

"For Irishmen, there is no football game to match rugby and if all our young men played rugby not only would we beat England and Wales but France and the whole lot of them put together."

"Of course I wrote most of the Constitution myself. I remember hesitating for a long time over the US presidential system. But it wouldn't have done — we were too trained in English democracy to sit down under a dictatorship which is what the American system really is."

"Ministers not responsible to parliament — that would never do. Besides, I wanted to prepare a nice quiet job without too much work for my old age. Still, I admit, I was tempted. Look at the way de Gaulle rules France … absolute rule … very efficient."

"England pretends it is not by the naked sword, but by the good will of the people of the country that she is here. We will draw the naked sword to make her bare her own naked sword."