Take time to deliberate, but when the time for action has arrived, stop thinking and go in.
The art of government is not to let me grow stale.
I pay attention only to what people do or say. I never pay attention to what they think.
Do you know what astonished me the most in this world? The inability of force to create anything.
A man does not have himself killed for a half-pence a day or for a petty distinction.You must speak to the soul in order to electrify him
The art of land warfare is an art of genius, of inspiration. On the sea nothing is genius or inspiration; everything is positive or empiric.
Friendship is but a name. I love no one.
The true wealth of a state consists in the number of its inhabitants, in their toil and industry.
We frustrate many designs against us by pretending not to see them.
In our time no one has the conception of what is great. It is up to me to show them.
Strangers are just friends waiting to happen. To become a good man, one must have faithful friends, or outright enemies.
While I live I will never resort to irredeemable paper.
You become strong by defying defeat and by turning loss into gain and failure to success.
Vengeance is without foresight.
The process of quitting smoking doesn't end with the last cigarette. It's not quitting itself, the real key is staying quit
If you want to get on in this world make many promises, but don't keep them.
Much shedding of blood, many great actions, and triumphs, toil and perseverance are the end of all things human.
Democracy may become frenzied, but it has feelings and can be moved. As for aristocracy, it is always cold and never forgives.
I shall be an Attila to Venice.
I am conquered less by fortune than by the egotism and ingratitude of my companions in arms.
When you set out to take Vienna, take Vienna.
War justifies everything.
A beautiful woman like eyes, and a good heart; One is a beautiful thing, and other treasures.
Great men are meteors designed to burn so that earth may be lighted.
In war, men are nothing, one man is everything.
I may be accused or rashness, but not sluggishness.
In war, the moral element and public opinion are half the battle.
It is easy to know when a government wishes for peace by observing the character of the person sent to negotiate for it.
In war, the general alone can judge of certain arrangements. It depends on him alone to conquer difficulties by his own superior talents and resolution.
Conquest has made me what I am, only conquest can maintain me.
England is a nation of shopkeepers.
The reason I beat the Austrians is, they did not known the value of five minutes
I love power. But it is as an artist that I love it. I love it as a musician loves his violin, to draw out its sounds and chords and harmonies.
The art of the police is not to see what it is useless that it should see.
The only conquests that are permanent and leave no regrets are our conquests over ourselves.
In war, character and opinion make more than half of the reality.
Passions change, politics are immutable.
Time is the great art of man.
Europe is a molehill. All great empires and revolutions have been on the Orient; six hundred millions live there.
The inevitable end of multiple chiefs is that they fade and disappear for lack of unity.
If you want a thing done well, do it yourself.
As a rule it is circumstances that make men.
The art of war is to gain time when your strength is inferior.
Our credulity is a part of the imperfection of our natures. It is inherent in us to desire to generalize, when we ought, on the contrary, to guard ourselves very carefully from this tendency.
War is a serious game in which a man risks his reputation, his troops, and his country. A sensible man will search himself to know whether or not he is fitted for the trade.
The division of labor, which has brought such perfection in mechanical industries, is altogether fatal when applied to productions of the mind. All work of the mind is superior inproportion as the mind that produces it is universal.
My mind is a chest of drawers. When I wish to deal with a subject, I shut all the drawers but the one in which the subject is to be found. When I am wearied, I shut all the drawers and go to sleep.
Friends must always be treated as if one day they might be enemies.
A woman laughing is a woman conquered.
True character stands the test of emergencies. Do not be mistaken, it is weakness from which the awakening is rude.
It is not set speeches at the moment of battle that render soldiers brave.
The secret of great battles consists in knowing how to deploy and concentrate at the right time.
But it is at home and not in public that one should wash ones dirty linen.[Fr., Car c'est en famille, ce n'est pas en public, qu'un lave son linge sale.]
When small men attempt great enterprises, they always end by reducing them to the level of their mediocrity.
The act of policing is, in order to punish less often, to punish more severely.
One bad general is worth two good ones.
Put your iron hand in a velvet glove.
The great difficulty with politics is, that there are no established principles.
What is a throne? - a bit of wood gilded and covered in velvet. I am the state- I alone am here the representative of the people. Even if I had done wrong you should not have reproached me in public - people wash their dirty linen at home. France has more need of me than I of France.
My downfall raises me to infinite heights.
