Isaac D'Israeli Quotes

With no more than six levels of misquotation, any statement can be made to say whatever you wish.

I think quotes are very dangerous things.

Be careful -- with quotations, you can damn anything.

When you take somebody's quote out of context, which happens all the time, nobody's ever going to go and do the research on their own and figure out that you got it wrong.

The devil can cite Scripture for his purpose.

History is one of those things that politicians tend not to use.

Every error is truth abused.

Being a language, mathematics may be used not only to inform but also, among other things, to seduce.

Between thought and spoken word is a gap where intention can enter, the symbol be twisted aside, and the lie come to be.

When campaigns use one-word labels, typically it's meant to distract and destroy.

Advertising is the modern substitute for argument; its function is to make the worse appear the better.

A good portion of speaking will consist in knowing how to lie.

People have used my views for purposes which are very different from mine.

One has to secrete a jelly in which to slip quotations down people's throats - and one always secretes too much jelly.

A good catchword can obscure analysis for fifty years.

Using vague, slippery or just meaningless language is not the same as lying: it's not intended to deceive so much as to preserve options, buy time, distance oneself from others, or just to sound like you're saying something instead of nothing.

If you want to convince somebody, make up a quote and attribute it to some renowned authority …. People are incredibly gullible.

It is an occupational hazard to be quoted out of context.

What institution is insusceptible of abuse in wicked hands?

The Politician uses the language of diplomacy of which he is a master, and it consists in telling some of the truth without necessarily exhausting it.

Political language -- and with variations this is true of all political parties, from Conservatives to Anarchists -- is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind.

Words had to change their ordinary meaning and to take that which was now given them. Reckless audacity came to be considered the courage of a loyal ally; prudent hesitation, specious cowardice; moderation was held to be a cloak for unmanliness; ability to see all sides of a question, inaptness to act on any. Frantic violence became the attribute of manliness; cautious plotting, a justifiable means of self-defense. The advocate of extreme measures was always trustworthy; his opponent a man to be suspected. To succeed in a plot was to have a shrewd head, to divine a plot a still shrewder; but to try to provide against having to do either was to break up your party and to be afraid of your adversaries.

There are some people in this world who always turn and twist the spoken word out of proportion.

It's unfortunate people can twist and turn things to fit whatever narrative they'd like it to fit.

I don't mind being asked anything! Not at all. I tell you what is annoying, is when you say something and somebody writes something that's completely different to what you said, and you're like, 'well that's not nice, because that's not what happened.'