Revolution 

1. Better to abolish serfdom from above than to wait till it begins to abolish itself from below.
   Alexander II (‘the Liberator’) 1818–81 Russian monarch, Tsar from 1855: speech in Moscow, 30 March 1856
2. The most radical revolutionary will become a conservative on the day after the revolution.
   Hannah Arendt 1906–75 American political philosopher: in New Yorker 12 September 1970
3. To-morrow for the young the poets exploding like bombs,
   The walks by the lake, the weeks of perfect communion;
   To-morrow the bicycle races
   Through the suburbs on summer evenings: but to-day the struggle.
   
    
   W. H. Auden 1907–73 English poet: ‘Spain 1937’ (1937) st. 20
4. Those who have served the cause of the revolution have ploughed the sea.
   Simón Bolívar 1783–1830 Venezuelan patriot and statesman: attributed
5. Revolutions are celebrated when they are no longer dangerous.
   Pierre Boulez 1925–2016 French conductor and composer: in Guardian 13 January 1989
6. Rebellion to tyrants is obedience to God.
   John Bradshaw 1602–59 English judge at the trial of Charles I: suppositious epitaph; later motto of Thomas Jefferson
7. Would it not be easier
   In that case for the government
   To dissolve the people
   And elect another?
   
    
   on the uprising against the Soviet occupying forces in East Germany in 1953
   Bertolt Brecht 1898–1956 German dramatist: ‘The Solution’ (1953)
8. What is a rebel? A man who says no.
   Albert Camus 1913–60 French novelist, dramatist, and essayist: The Rebel (1951)
9. All modern revolutions have ended in a reinforcement of the State.
   Albert Camus 1913–60 French novelist, dramatist, and essayist: The Rebel (1951)
10. History will absolve me.
    Fidel Castro 1927–2016 Cuban statesman: title of pamphlet (1953)
11. And [with] the guts of the last priest
    Let's shake the neck of the last king.
    
     
    Denis Diderot 1713–84 French philosopher and man of letters: Dithrambe sur fête de rois; see Meslier
12. The Revolution is made by man, but man must forge his revolutionary spirit from day to day.
    Ernesto (‘Che’) Guevara 1928–67 Argentinian revolutionary: Socialism and Man in Cuba (1968)
13. When the people contend for their liberty, they seldom get anything by their victory but new masters.
    George Savile, Lord Halifax (‘the Trimmer’) 1633–95 English politician and essayist: Political, Moral, and Miscellaneous Thoughts and Reflections (1750) ‘Of Prerogative, Power and Liberty’
14. Maximilien Robespierre was nothing but the hand of Jean Jacques Rousseau, the bloody hand that drew from the womb of time the body whose soul Rousseau had created.
    Heinrich Heine 1797–1856 German poet: Zur Geschichte der Religion und Philosophie in Deutschland (1834)
15. I will die like a true-blue rebel. Don't waste any time in mourning—organize.
    before his death by firing squad
    Joe Hill 1879–1915 Swedish-born American labour leader and songwriter: farewell telegram to Bill Haywood, 18 November 1915
16. Revolution's delightful in the preliminary stages. So long as it's a question of getting rid of people at the top.
    Aldous Huxley 1894–1963 English novelist: Eyeless in Gaza (1936)
17. A little rebellion now and then is a good thing.
    Thomas Jefferson 1743–1826 American Democratic Republican statesman, 3rd President 1801–9: letter to James Madison, 30 January 1787, in Papers of Thomas Jefferson (1955) vol. 11
18. Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable.
    John F. Kennedy 1917–63 American Democratic statesman, 35th President 1961–3: speech at the White House, 13 March 1962
19. An ignorant, uneducated man…said he wished…that all the great men in the world and all the nobility could be hanged, and strangled with the guts of priests.
    often quoted ‘I should like…the last of the kings to be strangled with the guts of the last priest’
    Jean Meslier c.1664–1733 French priest: Testament (ed. R. Charles, 1864) vol. 1, ch. 2; see Diderot
20. A revolution does not last more than fifteen years, the period which coincides with the flourishing of a generation.
    José Ortega y Gasset 1883–1955 Spanish writer and philosopher: The Revolt of the Masses (1930)
21. A share in two revolutions is living to some purpose.
    Thomas Paine 1737–1809 English political theorist: Eric Foner Tom Paine and Revolutionary America (1976)
22. Revolutions are not made; they come. A revolution is as natural a growth as an oak. It comes out of the past. Its foundations are laid far back.
    Wendell Phillips 1811–84 American abolitionist: speech 8 January 1852
23. Après nous le déluge.
    After us the deluge.
    Madame de Pompadour 1721–64 French favourite of Louis XV of France: Madame du Hausset Mémoires (1824)
24. I know, and all the world knows, that revolutions never go backward.
    William Seward 1801–72 American politician: speech at Rochester, 25 October 1858
25. Revolutions have never lightened the burden of tyranny: they have only shifted it to another shoulder.
    George Bernard Shaw 1856–1950 Irish dramatist: Man and Superman (1903) ‘The Revolutionist's Handbook’ foreword
26. J'ai vécu.
    I survived.
    when asked what he had done during the French Revolution
    Emmanuel Joseph Sieyès 1748–1836 French abbot and statesman: F. A. M. Mignet Notice historique sur la vie et les travaux de M. le Comte de Sieyès (1836)
27. The social order destroyed by a revolution is almost always better than that which immediately preceded it, and experience shows that the most dangerous moment for a bad government is generally that in which it sets about reform.
    Alexis de Tocqueville 1805–59 French historian and politician: L'Ancien régime (1856)
28. Bliss was it in that dawn to be alive,
    But to be young was very heaven!
    
     
    William Wordsworth 1770–1850 English poet: ‘The French Revolution, as it Appeared to Enthusiasts’ (1809); also The Prelude (1850) bk. 9, l. 108
29. Too early to say.
    in a conversation with Henry Kissinger about the success of revolutions in France, early 1970s. This has been widely quoted as referring to the French revolution of 1789, but Nixon's interpreter Chas Freeman and Chinese archives make clear that while questioned about the French revolution and the Paris Commune, Zhou Enlai in reply was clearly referring to the Paris riots of 1968
    Zhou Enlai (Chou En Lai) 1898–1976 Chinese Communist statesman, Prime Minister 1949–76: in Financial Times 10 June 2011