Margaret Thatcher Quotes

“For Dicey, writing in 1885, and for me reading him some seventy years later, the rule of law still had a very English, or at least Anglo-Saxon, feel to it. It was later, through Hayek's masterpieces "The Constitution of Liberty" and "Law, Legislation and Liberty" that I really came to think this principle as having wider application.”

“Each generation has to stand up for democracy. It can't take anything for granted and may have to fight fundamental battles anew.”

“There is a nonsense about intelligent women not being beautiful.”

“The woman's mission is not to enhance the masculine spirit, but to express the feminine; hers is not to preserve a man-made world, but to create a human world by the infusion of the feminine element into all of its activities.”

“In the same period that the Americans have lived under one constitution our French friends notched up five. A Punch cartoon has a 19th century Englishman asking a librarian for a copy of the French constitution, only to be told: 'I am sorry Sir, we do not stock periodicals.'”

“The election of a man committed to the cause of freedom and the renewal of America's strength has given encouragement to all those who love liberty.”

“I seem to smell the stench of appeasement in the air.”

“To me consensus seems to be - the process of abandoning all beliefs, principles, values and policies in search of something in which no-one believes, but to which no-one objects.”

“Europe is... a monument to the vanity of individuals, a programme whose inevitable destiny is failure.”

“The mission of this government is much more than the promotion of economic progress. It is to renew the spirit and solidarity of the nation.”

“I am much nearer to creating one nation than Labour will ever be. Socialism is two nations. The privileged rulers, and everyone else. And it always gets to that. What I am desperately trying to do is create one nation with everyone being a man of property, or having the opportunity to be a man of property.”

“Defeat? I do not recognize the meaning of the word.”

“Platitudes? Yes, there are platitudes. Platitudes are there because they are true.”

“How thin is the crust of order over the fires of human appetite and the lust for naked power.”

“We Conservatives hate unemployment.”

“The Nuremburg trials were attacked at the time as 'victor's justice'. And this is precisely what they were - and were intended to be.”

“What really gets me is this - it's very ironic that those who are most critical of extra tax are those who are most vociferous in demanding extra expenditure. What gets me even more is that having demanded that extra expenditure they are not prepared to face the consequences of their own action and stand by the necessity to get the tax to pay for it. I wish some of them had a bit more guts and courage than they have.”

“Rogue states never turn out to be quite the pariahs they are deemed. They are only able to cause, or at least threaten to cause, mayhem because they enjoy the covert support - usually by means of technology transfers - of one or more major powers within the charmed circle of global 'good guys'.”

“Nevertheless, the Tenth Commandment-'Thou shalt not covet'-recognizes that making money and owning things could become selfish activities. But it is not the creation of wealth that is wrong, but love of money for its own sake. The spiritual dimension comes in deciding what one does with the wealth. How could we respond to the many calls for help, or invest for the future, or support the wonderful artists or craftsmen whose work also glorifies God, unless we had first worked hard and used our talents to create the necessary wealth?”

“When you stop a dictator, there are always risks. But there are greater risks in not stopping a dictator.”

“Ladies and gentlemen, I stand before you tonight in my … chiffon evening gown, my face softly made up, my fair hair gently waved, the Iron Lady of the Western world. Me? A Cold War warrior? … Well, yes — if that is how they wish to interpret my defense of values of freedoms fundamental to our way of life.”

“Ought we not to ask the media to agree among themselves a voluntary code of conduct, under which they would not say or show anything which could assist the terrorists' morale or their cause while the hijack lasted.”

“Their pitiless ideology only survives because it is maintained by force. But the day comes when the anger and frustration of the people is so great that force cannot contain it. Then the edifice cracks: the mortar crumbles.”

“I have never knowingly made a non-controversial speech in my life.”

“Look at a day when you are supremely satisfied at the end. It's not a day when you lounge around doing nothing; it's a day you've had everything to do and you've done it.”