Henry Temple, 3rd Viscount Palmerston

Henry John Temple, 3rd Viscount Palmerston (1784-1865) was a British Liberal politician and Prime Minister from 1855-1858 and 1859-1865.

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Therefore I say that it is a narrow policy to suppose that this country or that is to be marked out as the eternal ally or the perpetual enemy of England. We have no eternal allies, and we have no perpetual enemies. Our interests are eternal and perptual, and those interests it is our duty to follow.
- Speech to the House of Commons, Hansard, 1 March 1848.

I therefore fearlessly challenge the verdict which this House, as representing a political, a commercial, a constitutional country, is to give on the question now brought before it; whether the principles on which the foreign policy of Her Majesty's government has been conducted, and the sense of duty which has led us to think ourselves bound to afford protection to our fellow subjects abroad, are proper and fitting guides for those who are charged with the government of England; and whether, as the Roman, in days of old, held himself free from indignity when he could say Civis Romanus sum; so also a British subject, in whatever land he may be, shall feel confident that the watchful eye and the strong arm of England will protect him against injustice and wrong.
- Speech in the House of Commons, 25 June 1850.

The time is fast coming when we shall be obliged to strike another blow in China...These half-civilized Governments such as those in China, Portugal, Spanish America all require a dressing every eight or ten years to keep them in order. Their minds are too shallow to receive an impression that will last longer than some such period and warning is of little use. They care little for words and they must not only see the stick but actually feel it on their shoulders before they yield.
- 29 September 1850.

You lay down broadly the doctrine of universal suffrage which I can never accept. I deny that every sane and not disqualified man has a moral right to vote. What every man and woman too have a right to, is to be well governed and under just laws, and they who propose a change ought to show that the present organisation does not accomplish those objects.
- Letter to William Gladstone, 12 May 1864

The Truth is that a vote is not a Right but a Trust. All the Nation cannot by Possibility be brought together to vote and therefore a Selected few are appointed by Law to perform this Function for the Rest and the Publicity attached to the Performance of this Trust is a Security that it will be responsibly performed.
- Palmerston's memorandum, 15 May 1864 (Broadlands Papers, H.M.C., PM/A/16).

Russia will in due time become a power almost as great as the old Roman Empire. She can become mistress of all Asia, except British India, whenever she chooses to take it; and when enlightened arrangements shall have made her revenue proportioned to her territory, and railways shall have abridged distances her command of men will become enormous, her pecuniary means gigantic, and her power of transporting armies over great distances most formidable. Germany ought to be strong in order to resist Russian aggression, and a strong Prussia is essential to German strength.
- Letter to Lord John Russell, 13 September 1865 in E. Ashley (ed.), The Life of Henry John Temple, Viscount Palmerston 1846-1865 (London, 1876), pp. 270-1.

'a Frenchman, thinking to be highly complimentary, said to Palmerston: "If I were not a Frenchman, I should wish to be an Englishman"; to which Pam coolly replied: "If I were not an Englishman, I should be wish to be an Englishman".'
- W. E. Gladstone recounting the conversation to Lord Rendel in 1889. F. E. Hamer (ed.) The Personal Papers of Lord Rendel (London: Ernest Benn Ltd, 1931), p. 60.

The Schleswig-Holstein question is so complicated, only three men in Europe have ever understood it. One was Prince Albert, who is dead. The second was a German professor who became mad. I am the third and I have forgotten all about it.

Warmed by the instincts of a knightly heart, That roused at once if insult touched the realm, He spurned each Statecraft, each deceiving art, And met his foes, no vizor to his helm. This proved his worth; hereafter be our boast: Who hated Britons hated him the most.
- Bernal Osborne adapting a Bulwer-Lytton poem at a speech to the Reform Club, 1850.

Then you know what to avoid. Do the exact opposite of what he did. His administration at the Foreign Office was one long crime.
- John Bright to Lord Rosebery in 1886, after asking him whether he had read about Palmerston's policies at the Foreign Office. (The Fifth Earl of Rosbery's journal, 17 March 1886.)