Eleftherios Venizelos quotes

Eleftherios Venizelos was a prominent Greek statesman and diplomat who played a decisive role in modern Greek history. His leadership helped shape Greece’s borders and its political landscape during the early 20th century. He is remembered as a visionary reformer and a key architect of modern Greece. Here are 13 of his quotes:

A party should be founded not merely on numbers, but on moral principles, without which it can neither accomplish useful work nor inspire confidence.

Eleftherios Venizelos

One cannot kick against geography!

Eleftherios Venizelos

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.

Eleftherios Venizelos

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.

Eleftherios Venizelos

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.

Eleftherios Venizelos

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.

Eleftherios Venizelos

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.

Eleftherios Venizelos

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.

Eleftherios Venizelos

England in all her wars has always gained one battle - the last!

Eleftherios Venizelos

When he is with me, I confess that his arguments are so convincing that I quickly begin to imagine that they are my own.

Eleftherios Venizelos

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.

Eleftherios Venizelos