"After all, though statistics are the childish foible of modern statesmen, who think that figures are estimates, we must cipher to estimate.

Figures are, moreover, the convincing argument of societies based on self-interest and money, and that is the sort of society the Charter has given us,--in my opinion, at any rate.

Nothing convinces the 'intelligent masses' as much as a row of figures.

All things in the long run, say the statesmen of the Left, resolve themselves into figures.
Well then, let us figure" [the minister here goes off into a corner with a deputy, to whom he talks in a low voice].

"There are forty thousand government clerks in France.