“Great events make me quiet and calm; it is only trifles that irritate my nerves.”

Everybody grows but me.

We are not interested in the possibilities of defeat. They do not exist.

The danger to the country, to Europe, to her vast Empire, which is involved in having all these great interests entrusted to the shaking hand of an old, wild, and incomprehensible man of 82, is very great!

I positively think that ladies who are always enceinte quite disgusting; it is more like a rabbit or guinea-pig than anything else and really it is not very nice.

An ugly baby is a very nasty object – and the prettiest is frightful.

We will not have failure – only success and new learning.

Bring me a cup of tea and the ‘Times.’

I would venture to warn against too great intimacy with artists as it is very seductive and a little dangerous.

I think people really marry far too much; it is such a lottery after all, and for a poor woman a very doubtful happiness.

I am every day more convinced that we women, if we are to be good women, feminine and amiable and domestic, are not fitted to reign; at least it is they that drive themselves to the work which it entails.

That Book, the Bible, accounts for the supremacy of England. England has become great & happy by the knowledge of the true God through Jesus Christ.

Being pregnant is an occupational hazard of being a wife.

[On same-sex marriage:] No woman would do that.

Being married gives one one’s position like nothing else can.

Were women to “unsex” themselves by claiming equality with men, they would become the most hateful, heathen, and disgusting of beings and would surely perish without male protection.

Give my people plenty of beer, good beer, and cheap beer, and you will have no revolution among them.

Consolation Calm down. Both your sins and your good deeds will be lost in oblivion.

Love yourself through all storms, calm moments and boredom – know you deserve love.

Be like a duck. Calm on the surface, but always paddling like the dickens underneath.

Familiar things are a comfort to us all.

I like these calm little moments before the storm, it reminds me of Beethoven.

In my experience, it’s all wonderful with girls until about 16. Around that time, boys kind of calm down and start focusing their testosterone. Girls get a little challenging, especially for fathers.

I don’t know how electricity works. All I know is that it calms me.

Calmness will always produce solutions. No revolution ever began without a sharp exhale.