William Cobbett

William Cobbett
William Cobbettwas an English pamphleteer, farmer and journalist, who was born in Farnham, Surrey. He believed that reforming Parliament and abolishing the rotten boroughs would help to end the poverty of farm labourers, and he attacked the borough-mongers, sinecurists and "tax-eaters" relentlessly. He was also against the Corn Laws, a tax on imported grain. Early in his career, he was a loyalist supporter of King and Country: but later he joined and successfully publicised the radical movement, which led to...
NationalityEnglish
ProfessionPolitician
Date of Birth9 March 1763
I defy you to agitate any fellow with a full stomach.
You may twist the word freedom as long as you please, but at last it comes to quiet enjoyment of your own property, or it comes to nothing. Why do men want any of those things that are called political rights and privileges? Why do they, for instance, want to vote at elections for members of parliament? Oh! Because they shall then have an influence over the conduct of those members. And of what use is that? Oh! Then they will prevent the members from doing wrong.
Another great evil arising from this desire to be thought rich; or rather, from the desire not to be thought poor, is the destructive thing which has been honored by the name of 'speculation'; but which ought to be called Gambling.
Praise the child, and you make love to the mother.
Never esteem men on account of their riches or their station. Respect goodness, find it where you may.
Men fail much oftener from want of perseverance than from want of talent.
Nothing is so well calculated to produce a death-like torpor in the country as an extended system of taxation and a great national debt.
Sit down to write what you have thought, and not to think what you shall write.
It is by attempting to reach the top at a single leap that so much misery is caused in the world.