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Quote#Desire

I am not by any means much pained, but I am much surprised at this…

Quote byWilliam Ewart Gladstone · 1809–1898

Commonly attributed — not confirmed in an authoritative edition. Cited on Wikiquote to: Letter to Lord Granville (4 January 1882), quoted in The Gladstone Diaries, with Cabinet Minutes and Prime-Ministerial Correspondence: Volume X: January 1881–June 1883, ed. H. C. G. Matthew (1990), p. lxviii.

English (original)

I am not by any means much pained, but I am much surprised at this rapid development of a national sentiment and party in Egypt. ... ‘Egypt for the Egyptians’ is the sentiment to which I should wish to give scope: and could it prevail it would I think be the best, the only good solution of the ‘Egyptian question’.

— William Ewart Gladstone

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