Eleftherios Venizelos (1864 – 1936)
Greek politician.
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I do not wish to depreciate his great gifts and attainments in a country which unfortunately, if I may say so without offense, is suffering from a temporary lack of leading men."
Greece expects you not merely to die for her, for that is little, indeed; she expects you to conquer. That is why each one of you, even in dying, should be possessed by one thought alone – how to conserve your strength to the last so that those who survive may conquer.
And you will conquer, I am more than sure of this.
Merely the fact that his name has been so dominant among all citizens of this country - with his supporters known as Venizelists and his opponents as anti-Venizelists - testifies to the significance of the deceased and the role he played.
I had to decide [he said later] whether I would be a lawyer by profession and a revolutionary at intervals, or a revolutionary by profession and a lawyer at intervals.
The European policy is invariably the maintenance of the status quo, and you will do nothing for the subject races unless we, by taking initiative, make you realize that helping us against the Turks is the lesser of the evils.
One cannot kick against geography!
When the two of us are alone and we disagree, Venizelos never convinces me! If we are three of us, I begin to waver. The moment he address several people, at cabinet meeting for instance, it often happens that I am carried away too, along with the others!
Of course the King is mistaken. But is natural that he should be frighten of taking the plunge. We have lost a great opportunity by not intervening at once. But later the King may change his mind, and it may be not too late.
A party should be founded not merely on numbers, but on moral principles, without which it can neither accomplish useful work nor inspire confidence.
All my life with all my heart I wanted the union of Crete and Greece. I wanted it to be sustained by profound mutual affection. I swear that was my only desire. . . . Greece will never see me again.
I am not going to talk of the grandeur of the Acropolis, nor do I intend to torment you with a lecture on archaeology. I have been to see strange and picturesque lands, among them Crete. You will never guess, though, my most interesting discovery in the island, one more interesting by far than the splendours of the excavations. I will tell you. A young advocate, a M. Venezuelos . . . Venizelos? Frankly, I cannot quite recall his name, but the whole of Europe will be speaking of him in a few years.
When he is with me, I confess that his arguments are so convincing that I quickly begin to imagine that they are my own.
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