"The theory then is that while the economy continues to flounder under - the Conservatives (the current crop of Ministers reminds me of Edward Scissorhands trying to make balloon animals), they can get in a leader more to their liking."

"He is the first man for 20 years to make the Presidency a part-time job, a means of filling up a few of the otherwise blank days of retirement."

"Peter Mandelson is the only man I know who can skulk in broad daylight."

"I'm often amazed at the way politicians – who spend hours poring over opinion poll results in a desperate attempt to discover what the public thinks – are certain they know precisely what God's views are on everything."

"Mr Arbuthnot did not respond, but sat with a thin, weak smile, like winter sunshine upon a coffin lid."

"In Washington, the first thing people tell you is what their job is. In Los Angeles you learn their star sign. In Houston you're told how rich they are. And in New York they tell you what their rent is."

"Beloved Scotland of the winter and the hills! ’Tis little that thou’lt get from them, but they will make thee hard and brave!"

"It must be the old, darling, foolish Highlands in us, my dear, the old people and the old stupid stories they are telling us for generations round he fire, and it must be the hills about us, and the constant complaint of the sea."

"The few contributions we have made to literature have not seemed to stem the tide of prejudice, nor have the efforts of Cable and Donelly changed the place in literature given to us by Mrs. Stowe, Joel Harris, Opie Reid. Nowhere do we find spread to the world’s gaze a work that portrays Afro-American life in its true likeness. Twenty-five years of freedom have furnished novel coloring and strange situations out of which to evolve a strong, vigorous sketch of Afro-American life at its best, and illustrate the genius which has dominated the rapid progress. The splendid mental and literary equipment of some of our finest scholars; the fragments of verse and prose of which we catch fleeting glimpses now and then, encourages the hope that from the race will yet come forth the masterpiece which, measured by the literature of the world, shall stamp its author a genius and at the same time elevate the Afro-American in literature."

"Once upon a time a Georgian printed a couple of books that attracted notice, but immediately it turned out that he was little more than an amanuensis for the local blacks--that his works were really the products, not of white Georgia, but of black Georgia. Writing afterward as a white man, he swiftly subsided into the fifth rank."

"Tater-vine growin’ w’ile you sleep."

"I seem to see before me the smiling faces of thousands of children some young and fresh and some wearing the friendly marks of age. But all children at heart and not an unfriendly face among them. And while I’m trying hard to speak the right word, I seem to hear a voice lifted above the rest saying you have made some of us happy. And so I feel my heart fluttering and my lips trembling, and I have to bow silently and turn away and hurry back into the obscurity that fits me best."

"Youk'n hide de fier, but w'at you gwine do wid de smoke?"

"Hungry rooster don't cackle w'en he fine a wum."

"Licker talks mighty loud w'en it gits loose from de jug."

"Jay-bird don't rob his own nes'."

"Lazy fokes's stummucks don't git tired."

"Ez soshubble ez a baskit er kittens."

"'I don't keer w'at you do wid me, Brer Fox,' sezee, 'so you don't fling me in dat brier-patch. Roas' me, Brer Fox' sezee, 'but don't fling me in dat brier-patch,' sezee."

"Brer Rabbit keep on axin' 'im, en de Tar-Baby, she keep on sayin' nothin', twel present'y Brer Rabbit draw back wid his fis', he did, en blip he tuck 'er side er de head. Right dar's whar he broke his merlasses jug. His fis' stuck, en he can't pull loose. De tar hilt 'im."

"Brer Fox, he lay low."

"No fundo da China existe um mandarim mais rico que todos os reis de que a fábula ou a história contam. Dele nada conheces, nem o nome, nem o semblante, nem a seda de que se veste. Para que tu herdes os seus cabedais infindáveis, basta que toques essa campainha, posta a teu lado, sobre um livro. Ele soltará apenas um suspiro, nesses confins da Mongólia. Será então um cadáver: e tu verás a teus pés mais ouro do que pode sonhar a ambição de um avaro. Tu, que me lês e és um homem mortal, tocarás tu a campainha?"

"'T is loving and serving The Highest and Best! 'T is onwards! unswerving, And that is true rest."

"'T is the brook's motion, Clear without strife, Fleeing to ocean After its life."

"Rest is not quitting The busy career, Rest is the fitting Of self to one's sphere."

"Is not true leisure One with true toil?"

"Work, and thou wilt bless the day Ere the toil be done; They that work not, can not pray, Can not feel the sun. God is living, working still, All things work and move; Work, or lose the power to will, Lose the power to love."

"O inglês cai sobre as ideias e as maneiras dos outros como uma massa de granito na água: e ali fica pesando, com a sua Bíblia, os seus clubes, os seus sports, os seus prejuízos, a sua etiqueta, o seu egoísmo – fazendo na circulação da vida alheia um incomodativo tropeço. É por isso que nos países onde vive há séculos é ele ainda o estrangeiro."

"E o abade pançudo que à tardinha, à varanda, palita o dente furado saboreando o seu café com um ar paterno, traz dentro em si os indistintos restos dum Torquemada."

"Estranha gente, para quem é fora de dúvida que ninguém pode ser moral sem ler a Bíblia, ser forte sem jogar o críquete e ser gentleman sem ser inglês! E é isto que os torna detestados. Nunca se fundem, nunca se desinglesam."

"No entanto a Inglaterra goza por algum tempo a «grande vitória do Afeganistão» com a certeza de ter de recomeçar daqui a dez anos ou quinze anos; porque nem pode conquistar e anexar um vasto reino, que é grande como a França, nem pode consentir, colados à sua ilharga, uns poucos de milhões de homens fanáticos, batalhadores e hostis. A «política», portanto, é debilitá-los periodicamente, com uma invasão arruinadora. São as fortes necessidades de um grande império."

"O Inglês, sem chá, bate-se frouxamente."

"Jovens de letras, meus amigos, ponde vossos olhos neste exemplo de ouro! Sê prudente, mancebo; nunca, ao entrar na carreira literária, publiques poema ou novela sem a antecipada precaução de ter sido durante alguns anos – primeiro-ministro de Inglaterra!"

"Talvez um dia, quando o socialismo for religião do Estado, se vejam em nichos de templo, com uma lamparina de frente, as imagens dos santos padres da revolução: Proudhon de óculos. Bakunine parecendo um urso sob as suas peles russas, Karl Marx apoiado ao cajado simbólico do pastor de almas tristes."

"As formas superiores do pensamento tem uma tendência fatal a tornar-se na futura lei revelada: e toda a filosofia termina, nos seus velhos dias, por ser religião."

"Em geral, nós outros, os Portugueses, só começamos a ser idiotas – quando chegamos à idade da razão. Em pequenos temos todos uma pontinha de génio."

"O esforço humano consegue, quando muito, converter um proletariado faminto numa burguesia farta; mas surge logo das entranhas da sociedade um proletariado pior. Jesus tinha razão: haverá sempre pobres entre nós. Donde se prova que esta humanidade é o maior erro que jamais Deus cometeu."

"Concluí, como se conclui sempre em Filosofia, que me encontrava diante duma Causa Primaria, portanto impenetrável."

"O amor espiritualiza o homem – e materializa a mulher."

"Sobre a nudez forte da verdade o manto diáfano da fantasia."

"The thing with Trinny is that she comes across as cold and aloof, but in fact she is the kindest woman I have ever met. She has a heart of gold. All these things — the books, TV programmes, interviews — they are not about the money. They are about wanting to help women with their insecurities. The steeliness people see in her is really a cover for her chronic shyness, believe me."

"Trinny and Susannah are what they are - there's no fakery."

"Trinny Woodall is a prime-time star, but is proper posh with mighty connections, as demonstrated by the six-figure sums she blagged from richer friends on Comic Relief does the Apprentice."

"Trinny is on the wrong side of skinny, but not anorexic, one of those people who burn calories because they never sit down."

"Trinny is definitely a hoarder. Her shoe cupboard is open and I lose count when I reach 78."

"Trinny Woodall knows everyone in Belgravia who earns more than £10 million a year so she got on the phone and the rest of us just went to the pub, it was great!"

"Trinny Woodall, one of the upper-crusty and scathingly blunt hosts of What Not to Wear, a hugely popular fashion makeover show on the BBC, does not mince words."

"Secretly, I like her brutality. I like it much better when she bitches than when she's tactful."

"“…reminds us why these two well-dressed, slightly chaotic, posh ladies are so entertaining”"

"If you ask anyone why they are driven, it’s not just money, it’s not just a need to prove themselves, it’s a combination of things, and for us if we can get women to look at themselves in terms of shape, not size, if Suze and I achieve that as our little gravestone thing, then that would be a fucking big achievement."