#pretext

What we believe to be the motives of our conduct are usually but the pretexts for it. ↗

— Miguel de Unamuno

#conduct #motives #our #pretexts #usually

Disturbances in society are never more fearful than when those who are stirring up the trouble can use the pretext of religion to mask their true designs. ↗

— Denis Diderot

#disturbances #fearful #mask #more #never

'Emergencies' have always been the pretext on which the safeguards of individual liberty have been eroded. ↗

— Friedrich August von Hayek

#been #emergencies #eroded #individual #individual liberty

If this phrase of the 'balance of power' is to be always an argument for war, the pretext for war will never be wanting, and peace can never be secure. ↗

— John Bright

#argument #balance #balance of power #never #peace

If you wish at once to do nothing and be respectable nowadays, the best pretext is to be at work on some profound study. ↗

— Leslie Stephen

#nothing #nowadays #once #pretext #profound

I never made a mistake in my life; at least, never one that I couldn't explain away afterwards. ↗

— Rudyard Kipling

#justification #mistakes #pretexts #humor

Pretexts are not wanting when one wishes to use them. ↗

— Carlo Goldoni

#them #use #wanting #wishes

There are house demolitions and destruction all over the West Bank and Gaza. Just yesterday in Gaza they demolished three towers under the pretext that they were built close to a settlement. ↗

— Ahmed Yassin

#built #close #demolished #destruction #gaza

I refer to calls for humanitarian intervention in the affairs of another state - a new idea, this - even when they are made under the pretext of defending human rights and freedoms. ↗

— Boris Yeltsin

#another #calls #defending #even #freedoms

In the first place, when there is a policy of intentional aggression, inspired by a desire to get possession of the territory or the trade of another country, right or wrong, a pretext is always sought. ↗

— Elihu Root

#always #another #country #desire #first