The Robes of the Tyrant
$22.00
Paperback
If there is any period one would desire to be born in, is it not the age of revolution when the old and the new stand side by side...when the glories of the old can be compensated by the rich possibilities of the new era.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
The most radical revolutionary will become a conservative the day after the revolution.
Hannah Arendt
Revolution is a trivial shift in the emphasis of suffering.
Tom Stoppard
The way of even the most justifiable revolution is prepared by personal impulses disguised into creeds
Joseph Conrad
We need the real, nation-wide terror which reinvigorates the country and through which the Great French Revolution achieved glory.
Vladimir Lenin
Vanity made the Revolution; liberty was only a pretext.
Napoleon Bonaparte
And yet a little tumult, now and then, is an agreeable quickener of sensation; such as a revolution...
Lord Byron
People will not look forward to posterity, who never look backward to their ancestors
Edmund Burke
Every successful revolution puts on in time the robes of the tyrant it has deposed
Barbara Tuchman
I have not always in my dealings with General de Gaulle found quotations from Trafalgar and Waterloo necessarily productive, and he has been very tactful about the Battle of Hastings.
Harold Wilson
The loss of the Battle of Waterloo was the salvation of France.
Thomas Jefferson
Revolutions have never lightened the burden of tyranny: they have only shifted it to another shoulder.
George Bernard Shaw
Revolution: in politics, an abrupt change in the form of misgovernment
Ambrose Bierce
We have a lot of people revolutionizing the world because they've never had to present a working model
Charles Kettering
Revolutions are not about trifles, but spring from trifles
Aristotle
...at the still point, there the dance is.”
—Burnt Norton - T. S. Eliot
About Rosy
Rosy Cole was born and educated in the Shires of England and now lives on the West Sussex coast. A professional writer for thirty years, she has worked as a Press Officer and Publisher's Reader and is a member of the Society of Authors (UK), the Historical...
Connections
Causes Rosy Cole Supports
World Vision, International Prison Outreach, Salvation Army, Emmaus Project, Poor Clares, DogsTrust, BUAV (against animal testing) WWT (Wildfowl &...
Rosy’s Favorite Books
Restoration - Rose Tremain, Rites of Passage - William Golding, The Waves - Virginia Woolf, To The Lighthouse - Virginia Woolf, Sunset Song - Lewis Grassic...
Little history...
Hi Rosy,
Little history lesson here for me..Looking at the pictures I was reminded of Joan of Arc. Kind of makes me want to watch that movie again..But I guess these were different times.. hope I'm right because I can't remember a thing!
Warm regards
Leslie
http://lesliemusoko.ning.com
Hello, Leslie
Yes, these were different times, as you say, but your comment is astute because the spirit of them was not dissimilar.
Joan of Arc, as you know, was pro the (true) French monarchy and her claim to have been guided by God is now well respected.
More than three centuries later, the ordinary French people, trapped in poverty and enduring many social inequalities, rose up against their own aristocracy and had King Louis XVI and Queen Marie Antoinette put to death. There followed were years of bloodshed which inspired the French Corsican militarist, Napoleon Bonaparte, to ride on the back of their cause and try to conquer the world, very much, I suspect, on the impulse of a monumental ego. Though the French Revolution was prompted by humanitarian ideals, God seems not to have figured in their calculations.
The British, at Waterloo, were merely defending their own land and
and dominions. It has largely been a characteristic of the British stance, if we are speaking of engagement in warfare, to be defenders rather than aggressors. Which is what makes the 'reasons' for our part in the Iraq War so lamentable and disinclined to ring true. There is a distinct mood, beneath our economic troubles - which some might feel do bear worthwhile comparison with Napoleonic times - that we have lost our soul.
Anyway, thanks for dropping by Leslie. Good to hear from you.
All best,
Rosy
the scary thing...
Thanks Rosy!
I think that the scary thing about your reply is that it's all written without a second thought or reference! How on earth do you manage to carry all this history in you?
Leslie
http://lesliemusoko.ning.com
But I love it!
The truth is I seldom have time for other reading at the moment, which is regrettable. I was also lucky to be educated when British history was a major part of the curriculum so had a good grounding.
That doesn't mean I don't have to check facts times over!
Rosy
I do love that Wilson
I do love that Wilson quote!
Instructive and well-presented as always. Head of the class! Mara
Mara, many thanks!
If only my teachers had been as appreciative!
Prime Minister Harold Wilson was noted for his dry sense of humour and is said by some to have got on well with the Queen. I think he is seen as having put the 'demo' in democracy and taken much of the mystique out of 10 Downing Street.