H H Asquith Quotes

I like to write when I feel spiteful. It is like having a good sneeze." (Letter to Cynthia Asquith, November 1913)

Horne was both a Congregational minister and a member of the British parliament. He had a reputation for eloquence in the House of Commons, and for passion in the pulpit. H. H. Asquith often went to hear him preach because, he said, “he had a fire in his belly.” Being both a politician and a preacher, he was able from personal experience to compare the two vocations, and he had no doubt which was the more influential: The preacher, who is the messenger of God, is the real master of society; not elected by society to be its ruler, but elect of God to form its ideals and through them to guide and rule its life. Show me the man who, in the midst of a community however secularized in manners, can compel it to think with him, can kindle its enthusiasm, revive its faith, cleanse its passions, purify its ambitions, and give steadfastness to its will, and I will show you the real master of society, no matter what party may nominally hold the reins of government, no matter what figurehead may occupy the ostensible place of authority.48

THE REASON WHY all this has to be stated here is simply that women, who could state it much better, have almost unanimously refrained from discussing such matters at all. One finds, indeed, a sort of general conspiracy, infinitely alert and jealous, against the publication of the esoteric wisdom of the sex, and even against the acknowledgment that any such body of erudition exists at all. Men, having more vanity and less discretion, are a good deal less cautious. There is, in fact, a whole literature of masculine babbling, ranging from Machiavelli's appalling confession of political theory to the egoistic confidences of such men as Nietzsche, Jean Jacques Rousseau, Casanova, Max Stirner, Benvenuto Cellini, Napoleon Bonaparte and Lord Chesterfield. But it is very rarely that a Marie Bashkirtsev or Margot Asquith lets down the veils which conceal the acroamatic doctrine of the other sex. It is transmitted from mother to daughter, so to speak, behind the door. One observes its practical workings, but hears little about its principles. The causes of this secrecy are obvious. Women, in the last analysis, can prevail against men in the great struggle for power and security only by keeping them disarmed, and, in the main, unwarned. In a pitched battle, with the devil taking the hindmost, their physical and economic inferiority would inevitably bring them to disaster. Thus they have to apply their peculiar talents warily, and with due regard to the danger of arousing the foe. He must be attacked without any formal challenge, and even without any suspicion of challenge. This strategy lies at the heart of what Nietzsche called the slave morality--in brief, a morality based upon a concealment of egoistic purpose, a code of ethics having for its foremost character a bold denial of its actual aim.

A trial judge should be quick, courteous and wrong. That is not to say that the Court of Appeal should be slow, rude and right, for that would be usurping the role of the House of Lords.

Por regla general, los monarcas solían ser conservadores, pero los acontecimientos recientes habían acentuado aún más el sentimiento de animadversión del rey. Había ascendido al trono en plena crisis política y, contra su voluntad, se había visto obligado por el primer ministro liberal H. H. Asquith —con el pleno respaldo de la opinión pública— a recortar el poder de la Cámara de los Lores. La herida de aquella humillación aún seguía abierta, y Su Majestad sabía que Fitz, como par conservador de la Cámara de los Lores, había luchado con todas sus fuerzas contra la llamada reforma.

No one who has not been through it can know the chilly, paralyzing, deadening depression of hope deferred and energy wasted and vitality run to seed. I sometimes think it is the most tragic thing in life.

Of all human troubles, the most hateful is to feel you have the capacity of power and yet you have no field to exercise it.

The Liberals were in a minority, but were strongly backed by the Irish Nationalists, even though they were themselves divided between pro- and anti-Parnellite factions. Gladstone’s last government included three subsequent Liberal prime ministers – Rosebery, Henry Campbell-Bannerman and H.H. Asquith, but his closest associate was John Morley, the Irish Chief Secretary, who was later to write his biography in three extensive volumes.