Boyle Roche

Sir Boyle Roche, 1st Baronet (October 1736 – 5 June 1807) was an Irish politician, famed for his highly ornamented and often inaccurate speech, which often included amusing mixed metaphors and malapropisms.

Quotes

• ...it is impossible I could have been in two places at once, unless I were a bird.
  • In parliament, alluding to Jevon’s play, The Devil of a Wife.
    • Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable

• There is no Levitical decree between nations, and on this occasion I can see neither sin nor shame in marrying our own sister.
  • In parliament, defending the proposed union of Ireland with Great Britain.
    • Barrington, Jonah. "Chapter XVII". Personal sketches and recollections of his own times. 

• Why we should put ourselves out of our way to do anything for posterity, for what has posterity ever done for us?
  • In a debate in the Irish House of Commons on the vote of a grant which was recommended by Sir John Parnell, Chancellor of the Exchequer, as one not likely to be felt burdensome for many years to come, it was observed in reply that the House had no right to load posterity with a debt for what could in no degree operate to their advantage. This quotation was Sir Boyle's response.
    • Barrington, Jonah. "Chapter XVII". Personal sketches and recollections of his own times. 

• It would surely be better … to give up not only a part, but, if necessary, even the whole, of our constitution, to preserve the remainder!
  • Arguing for the habeas corpus suspension bill in Ireland.
    • Barrington, Jonah. "Chapter XVII". Personal sketches and recollections of his own times. 
    • Falkiner, C. Litton (1902). "Sir Boyle Roche". Studies in Irish History and Biography, mainly of the Eighteenth Century. New York: Longmans, Green, and Co.. pp. p.237. 

• [...they] would cut us to mincemeat, and throw our bleeding heads on that table to stare us in the face.
  • In disparagement of the French revolution and its practitioners.
    • Barrington, Jonah. "Chapter XVII". Personal sketches and recollections of his own times. 

• The best way to avoid danger is to meet it plump.
  • In parliament.
    • Falkiner, C. Litton (1902). "Sir Boyle Roche". Studies in Irish History and Biography, mainly of the Eighteenth Century. New York: Longmans, Green, and Co.. pp. p.229. 

• I hope, my lord, if you ever come within a mile of my house that you will stay there all night.
  • In a letter.
    • Falkiner, C. Litton (1902). "Sir Boyle Roche". Studies in Irish History and Biography, mainly of the Eighteenth Century. New York: Longmans, Green, and Co.. pp. p.230. 

• [...I] answer boldly in the affirmative with an emphatic No!
  • Occasion unknown.
    • Falkiner, C. Litton (1902). "Sir Boyle Roche". Studies in Irish History and Biography, mainly of the Eighteenth Century. New York: Longmans, Green, and Co.. pp. p.237. 

Misattributed

• A quart bottle should hold a quart.
  • The title of a bill in the Irish House of Commons. Often misquoted as "a pint bottle should hold a quart."
    • Falkiner, C. Litton (1902). "Sir Boyle Roche". Studies in Irish History and Biography, mainly of the Eighteenth Century. New York: Longmans, Green, and Co.. pp. p.230. 

About

• Herodotus is not more indisputably the father of history than is Sir Boyle Roche the father of Bulls. No doubt there were makers of bulls before his day, even as brave men lived before Agamemnon; but they are not remembered, and if their bulls have survived them they are credited to Sir Boyle by a posterity generously forgiving and forgetful of his famous indictment.
  • Falkiner, C. Litton (1902). "Sir Boyle Roche". Studies in Irish History and Biography, mainly of the Eighteenth Century. New York: Longmans, Green, and Co.. pp. p.228. 

• ...as Sir Boyle Roche would say, like the last rose of summer...
  • Disraeli, Benjamin (1831). The Young Duke.