Nec audiendi qui solent dicere, vox populi, vox Dei, quum tumultuositas vulgi semper insaniae proxima sit. We should not listen to those who like to affirm that the voice of the people is the voice of God, for the tumult of the masses is truly close to madness.

-Alcuin
  Letter to Charlemagne.

People would rather sleep their way through life than stayawake for it.

-Albee, Edward Franklin, III
Quoted in  Joseph F McCrindle (ed) Behind the Scenes (1971).

I'm old fashioned. I don't believe in extra-marital relationships. I think people should mate for life, like pigeons or Catholics.

-Allen,Woody pseudonym of  Allen Stewart Konigsberg
  Manhattan (with Marshall Brickman).

It was no wonder that people were so horrible when they started life as children.

-Amis, Sir Kingsley
  One Fat Englishman, ch.14.

My theory isöwe don't really go that far into other people, even when we think we do.We hardly ever go in and bring them out.We just stand at the jaws of the cave, and strike a match, and ask quickly if anybody's there.

-Amis, Martin Louis
  Money.

The moment one of the people took one of the truths to himself, called it histruth, and tried to live his life by it, he became a grotesque and the truth he embraced a falsehood.

-Anderson, Sherwood
  Winesburg, Ohio,'The Book of the Grotesque'.

Boston, Boston, Boston! Thou hast naught to boast on, But a Grand Sluice, and a high steeple; c.1500 A proud conceited ignorant people, And a coast where souls are lost on.

-Anonymous
  Comment by visitor at the opening of the Grand Sluice, Boston, Lincolnshire,15 Oct. Quoted in  Jennifer  Westwood Albion (1985), ch. 6,'English Shires'.

Ein Reich, einVolk, ein Fu«  hrer. One realm, one people, one leader.

-Anonymous
  German Nazi slogan.

   Power to the people.

-Anonymous
  US Black Panther movement slogan.

Cannes†is10,000 people looking for10 people who really count.

-Anonymous
  Unknown French publicist speaking on the Cannes Film Festival. Quoted in the NewYork Times,17 May.

There are checks and balances in governmentöthe checksgo to candidates and the balance to the people.

-Anonymous
Quoted in Sunday Morning, CBS  T V broadcast,17 May1987.

Running a cemetery isjust like being President: you got a lot of people under you and nobody's listening.

-Anonymous
Quoted by Bill Clinton,10  Jan1995.

Je connais gens de toutes sortes Ils n'e¤  galent pas leur destin. I know people of all sorts They do not measure up to their destiny.

-Kostrowitzki
  Les  Alcools,'Marizibill'.

   How many people is the earth able to sustain?

-Asimov, Isaac
Der Spiegel.

He that will write well in any tongue, must follow this counsel of Aristotle, to speak as the common people do, to think as wise men do; and so should every man understand him, and the judgment of wise men allow him.

-Ascham, Roger
  Toxophilus,'To all Gentlemen andYeomen of England'.

We have seen todaya gallant, civilized and democratic people betrayed and handed over to a ruthless despotism.

-1st Earl
  House of Commons speech on Czechoslovakia, 3 Oct.

August for the people and their favourite islands. Daily the steamers sidle up to meet The effusive welcome of the pier.

-Auden,W(ystan) H(ugh)
  Look, Stranger, no.30.

'My idea of good company, Mr Elliot, is the company of clever, well-informed people, who have a great deal of conversation; that is what I call good company.' 'You are mistaken,'said he gently,'that is not good company, that is the best.'

-Austen,Jane
  Persuasion, ch.16.

The voice of the people hath some divineness in it, else how should so many men agree to be of one mind? Bacon

-Bacon, Francis,Viscount St Albans
  De Dignitiate et  Augmentis Scientiarum,  Antitheta no.9 (translated by Gilbert  Watts,1640).

Neither will it be, that a people overlaid with taxes should ever become valiant and martial.

-Bacon, Francis,Viscount St Albans
  Essays, no.29,'Of the True Greatness of Kingdoms'.