“A wine cellar requires order, forethought and good taste,’ the old man used to say. ‘These are the virtues that made Britain great.”

“He was like a man who has got used to drinking the finest wine, and now finds that everyday wine thats like vinegar.”

“And what if Britain lost? There would be a financial crisis, unemployment, and destitution. Working-class men would take up Ethel’s father’s cry and say that they had never been allowed to vote for the war. The people’s rage against their rulers would be boundless.”

“We’re all good when it suits us, he used to say: that doesn’t count. It’s when you want so badly to do something wrong—when you’re about to make a fortune from a dishonest deal, or kiss the lovely lips of your neighbor’s wife, or tell a lie to get yourself out of terrible trouble—that’s when you need the rules. Your integrity is like a sword, he would say: you shouldn’t wave it until you’re about to put it to the test.”

“He believed in Communism the way most people believed in God: he would not be greatly surprised or disappointed if he turned out to be wrong, and meanwhile it made little difference to the way he lived.”

“President Wilson says a leader must treat public opinion the way a sailor deals with the wind, using it to blow the ship in one direction or another, but never trying to go directly against it.”

“It was an odd relationship, but then she was an extraordinary woman: a prioress who doubted much of what the church taught; an acclaimed healer who rejected medicine as practised by physicians; and a nun who made enthusiastic love to her man whenever she could get away with it. If I wanted a normal relationship, Merthin told himself, I should have picked a normal girl.”