Austria Quotes

The power which a multiple millionaire, who may be my neighbor and perhaps my employer, has over me is very much less than that which the smallest "functionaire" possesses who wields the coercive power of the state, and on whose desecration it depends whether and how I am allowed to live or to work.

Men are not gentle, friendly creatures wishing for love, who simply defend themselves if they are attacked, but ... a powerful measure of desire for aggression had to be reckoned as part of their instinctual endowment.

Know, sir, that the first place in the empire is mine. From God I hold my power and my crown, and I depute them to no man--I alone reign in Austria.

The law is sawdust that had already been chewed by a thousand mouths.

Corruption is worse than prostitution. The latter might endanger the morals of an individual, the former invariably endangers the morals of the entire country.

Beyond a certain point there is no return. This point has to be reached.

… the state, the government, the laws must not in any way concern themselves with schooling or education. Public funds must not be used for such purposes. The rearing and instruction of youth must be left entirely to parents and to private associations and institutions…. Continued adherence to a policy of compulsory education is utterly incompatible with efforts to establish lasting peace.

Fear not those who argue but those who dodge.

When Paris sneezes, Europe catches a cold.

He who is unfit to serve his fellow citizens wants to rule them.

Serbia must now be dealt with.

Personally I prefer a liberal dictator to democratic government lacking liberalism.

We have a problem with political Islam in Austria.

Capitalism inevitably and by virtue of the very logic of its civilization creates, educates and subsidizes a vested interest in social unrest.

Laid up in ice [mis à la glace].

Nothing is so treacherous as the obvious.

This unfortunate partition of Poland, is costing me ten years of my life. It will make plain the whole unhappy history of that affair. How many times have I refused to agree to it! But disaster after disaster heaped upon us by the Turks; misery, famine, and pestilence at home; no hope of assistance either from France or England, and the prospect of being left isolated and threatened with a war both with Russia and Prussia,---it was all these considerations that finally forced me to accede to that unhappy proposal, which will remain a blot on my whole reign.

It’s often safer to be in chains than to be free.

I was born in 1923 into a middle class Jewish family in Vienna, a few years after the end of World War I, which was disastrous from the Austrian point of view.

Between the summer of 2015 and spring 2016, Austria became one of the European countries most affected by the migration and refugee crisis.

... the conservative does not object to coercion or arbitrary power so long as it is used for what he regards the right purpose .... Like the socialist, he regards himself as entitled to force the value he holds on other people.

We had to avoid wounding Austria too severely; we had to avoid leaving behind in her any unnecessary bitterness of feeling or desire for revenge; we ought rather to reserve the possibility of becoming friends again with our adversary of the moment, and in any case to regard the Austrian state as a piece on the European chessboard and the renewal of friendly relations as a move open to us. If Austria were severely injured, she would become the ally of France and of every other opponent of ours; she would even sacrifice her anti-Russian interests for the sake of revenge on Prussia.

Italy is a geographical concept.

From the saintly and single-minded idealist to the fanatic is often but a step.

Socialism was embraced by the greater part of the intelligentsia as the apparent heir of the liberal tradition: therefore it is not surprising that to them the idea of socialism's leading to the opposite of liberty should appear inconceivable.