When asked the qualities required to be a politician; "The ability to foretell what is going to happen tomorrow, next week, next month and next year. And to have the ability afterwards to explain why it didn't happen."
"No one pretends that democracy is perfect or all wise. Indeed, it has been said that democracy is the worst form of government except all those other forms that have been tried from time to time."
"The high belief in the perfection of man is appropriate in a man of the cloth but not in a Prime Minister"
Asked for a definition of a parliamentary candidate: "He is asked to stand, he wants to sit, he is expected to lie"
"Reconstructing a Cabinet is like solving a kaleidoscopic jigsaw puzzle."
"Headmasters have powers at their disposal with which Prime Ministers have never been invested."
"It would be a great reform in politics if wisdom could be made to spread as easily and rapidly as folly"
Interrupting an aging fellow member of Parliament: "I must warn him that he runs a very grave risk of falling into senility before he is overtaken by age."
After being interrupted himself: "I do not challenge the honourable gentlemen when the truth leaks out of him from time to time."
And another similar occasion: "If I valued the honourable gentlemans opinion I might get angry"
On the occasion of a Liberal MP crossing the floor to join the Socialists; "It is the only time I have seen a rat swimming towards a sinking ship."
"I see it is said that leaders should keep their ears to the ground. All I can say is that the British nation will find it very hard to look up to the leaders who are detected in that somewhat ungainly posture."
Out of office in 1947: "When I am abroad, I always make it a rule never to criticise or attack the government of my own country. I make up for lost time when I get home."
"The inherent vice of capitalism is the unequal sharing of blessings; the inherent virtue of socialism is the equal sharing of miseries."
"Politics is like waking up in the morning. You never know whose head you will find on the pillow."
"I well understand the Honourable Member's wishing to speak on. He needs the practice badly"
Churchill had an innovative idea to add to boxes of 10 inch long condom-like protective rubber sheaths designed to go over the barrels of British rifles when fighting in the arctic: "I want a label for every box, every carton, every packet, saying "British. Size: Medium". That will show the Nazis if they ever recover one of them, who's the master race."
On being told to flatter General de Gaulle, Churchill suggested: "I'll kiss him on both cheeks - or if you prefer on all four!"
When President Roosevelt wheeled (in his wheelchair) into the guest bathroom to find a naked Churchill emerging from his bath, Churchill said unashamedly: "The Prime Minister has nothing to hide from the President of the United States."
"There is only one thing worse than fighting with allies and that is fighting without them."
