Aristocrats Quotes

“You've got that eternal idiotic idea that if anarchy came it would come from the poor. Why should it? The poor have been rebels, but they have never been anarchists; they have more interest than anyone else in there being some decent government. The poor man really has a stake in the country. The rich man hasn't; he can go away to New Guinea in a yacht. The poor have sometimes objected to being governed badly; the rich have always objected to being governed at all. Aristocrats were always anarchists”
― G.K. Chesterton, The Man Who Was Thursday: A Nightmare

“The Aristocrat

The Devil is a gentleman, and asks you down to stay
At his little place at What'sitsname (it isn't far away).
They say the sport is splendid; there is always something new,
And fairy scenes, and fearful feats that none but he can do;
He can shoot the feathered cherubs if they fly on the estate,
Or fish for Father Neptune with the mermaids for a bait;
He scaled amid the staggering stars that precipice, the sky,
And blew his trumpet above heaven, and got by mastery
The starry crown of God Himself, and shoved it on the shelf;
But the Devil is a gentleman, and doesn't brag himself.

O blind your eyes and break your heart and hack your hand away,
And lose your love and shave your head; but do not go to stay
At the little place in What'sitsname where folks are rich and clever;
The golden and the goodly house, where things grow worse for ever;
There are things you need not know of, though you live and die in vain,
There are souls more sick of pleasure than you are sick of pain;
There is a game of April Fool that's played behind its door,
Where the fool remains for ever and the April comes no more,
Where the splendour of the daylight grows drearier than the dark,
And life droops like a vulture that once was such a lark:
And that is the Blue Devil that once was the Blue Bird;
For the Devil is a gentleman, and doesn't keep his word.”
― G.K. Chesterton, The Collected Works of G. K. Chesterton, Volume 10: Collected Poetry, Part 1

“The aristocrats, if such they could be called, generally hated the whole concept of the train on the basis that it would encourage the lower classes to move about and not always be available.”
― Terry Pratchett, Raising Steam

“Aristocrats don't notice philosophical conundra. They just ignore them. Philosophy includes contemplating the possibility that you might be wrong, sir, and a real aristocrat knows that he is always right. It's not vanity, you understand, it's built-in absolute certainty. They may sometimes be as mad as a hatful of spoons, but they are always definitely and certainly mad.”
― Terry Pratchett, Snuff

“But…” Both men looked over inquiringly when Maximus spoke. “But I never asked you to help me with Noakes.”

Makepeace nodded, his expression grave. “You didn’t have to.”

“You never had to,” St. John concurred.”
― Elizabeth Hoyt, Duke of Midnight

“His adolescents are displaced aristocrats who have lost their kingdom and wealth, which was childhood. [On J.D. Salinger]”
― Heather O'Neill

“He was awfully good at being aristocratic. Alexia, on the other hand, was only good at being autocratic. Not quite the same thing.”
― Gail Carriger, Timeless

“Most people go through life dreading they'll have a traumatic experience. Freaks were born with their trauma. They've already passed their test in life. They're aristocrats.”
― Diane Arbus, Untitled

“Aristocrats are like church bells: expensive, pretty, and only useful when regularly struck.”
― D.D. Webb, The Gods are Bastards

“Pardon me for budging into concoction of the aristocrats blowing their trumpets, the demagogues' doctrines, the antagonists' squeals, the hypocrites' assertions, the sycophants fawning adoration, the facebookers' slants, the youthful sneers, the pragmatic notions n of course some acquiescent aspirants....this facebook page is so bombarded by myriad posts....maddening to read n like all.....so here's wishing each one of the revered contestants all the best.....may the deserving win.....”
― Mukesh Kwatra

“Let Labor and Capital bicker amongst each other, while I, as idle Aristocracy, twiddle my fiddle in my pastoral idyll.”
― Pietros Maneos

“Paul and Olga enjoyed a gilded exile with their two daughters, in a home created together that was "worthy of a Pompadour or a Du Barry.”
― Helen Rappaport, After the Romanovs: Russian Exiles in Paris from the Belle Époque Through Revolution and War

“-It is true that I am part of the laughing-aristocrat structure, Charles said. I don't mean I am one of them. I mean I am their creature. They hold me in thrall.
Laughing aristocrats who invented the cost-plus contract . . .
Laughing aristocrats who invented the real estate broker . . .
Laughing aristocrats who invented Formica . . .
Laughing aristocrats wiping their surfaces clean with a damp cloth . . .
Charles poured himself another brilliant green Heineken.
-To the struggle!”
― Donald Barthelme, Sixty Stories

“Aristocracy, nowadays : A Man who keeps on showing his stolen Car Keys”
― Jean-Michel Rene SOUCHE, Paintings Catalogue: Paintings Catalogue by French Artist Jean-michel Rene Souche, Odessa

“...Fields told himself furiously that the humanists and humanitarians of all casts were undoubtedly the last and most arrogant aristocrats, that they never learned anything and always forgot everything They went into ecstasies over the splendor of nature, refused to be discouraged or to give up, and went on believing in liberty and humanity in spite of the evidence of forced labor camps and nationalistic hatred, of fear and cruelty and betrayal around them. They went on dreaming of freedom and of the rights of man, refusing to face the fact that their disappearance, like the disappearance of the elephants, was an irreversible process, the price paid by mankind for a new, modem and ruthlessly efficient world.”
― Romain Gary, The Roots of Heaven

“Tonight we are going to dazzle His Lordship's wealthy friends and leave them with empty purses, minds spinning that they allowed a couple of boys who once lived in the gutter to rob them so delightfully blind.”
― Maddy Kobar, From Out of Feldspar

“There are four things that an aristocrat should contribute to the modern world to countervail its ideological tendencies: the rejection of historical inevitability; the defense of the ethics of obligations; an acceptance of the body/soul dualism with the soul taking the dominant position; and a classical concept of shame. All of them are interrelated.”
― Ryszard Legutko, The Cunning of Freedom: Saving the Self in an Age of False Idols

“Contrary to the belief of those outside it, the aristocratic upbringing of their generation was harsh and demanding of self discipline.”
― Evelyn Anthony, The Tamarind Seed

“The only class I'm interested in, is the class of character, determined not by blood or money, but by intent and behavior.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Azad Earth Army: When The World Cries Blood