The original Quote:
A man who is not a liberal at sixteen has no heart; a man who is not a conservative at sixty has no head. -Benjamin Disraeli
Benjamin Disraeli, 1st Earl of Beaconsfield, KG, PC, FRS (born Benjamin D’Israeli; 21 December 180419 April 1881) was a British Conservative statesman and literary figure. He served in government for three decades, twice as Prime Ministerthe first and thus far only person of Jewish parentage to do so (although Disraeli was baptised in the Anglican Church at 13). Disraeli’s most lasting achievement was the creation of the modern Conservative Party after the Corn Laws schism of 1846.
Benjamin Disraeli, 1st Earl of Beaconsfield, KG, PC, FRS (born Benjamin DIsraeli; 21 December 180419 April 1881) was a British Conservative statesman and literary figure.
From the preface Hayek wrote for the 1956 edition of The Road to Serfdom:The fact that this book was originally written with only the British public in mind does not appear to have seriously affected its intelligibility for the American reader. But there is one point of phraseology which I ought to explain here to forestall any misunderstanding. I use throughout the term "liberal" in the original nineteenth-century sense in which it is still current in Britain. In current American usage it often means very nearly the opposite of this. It has been part of the camouflage of leftist movements in this country, helped by the muddleheadedness of many who really believe in liberty, that "liberal" has come to mean the advocacy of almost every kind of government control. I am still puzzled why those in the United States who truly believe in liberty should not only have allowed the left to appropriate this almost indispensable term but should even have assisted by beginning to use it themselves as a term of opprobrium. This seems to be particularly regrettable because of the consequent tendency of many true liberals to describe themselves as conservatives.In that context the Disraeli quote takes on an entirely different different meaning.