Background Image

...

Every Man Who Is Worth Thirty Millions And Is Not Wedded To Them, Is Dangerous To The Government.

-Napoleon Bonaparte

...

Please Wait....
Translating....

Every Man Who Is

Napoleon Bonaparte

...

Every Man Who Is Worth Thirty Millions And Is Not Wedded To Them, Is Dangerous To The Government.

Views: 3713

Topic

More From Napoleon Bonaparte

To Have A Right Estimate Of A Man's Character, We Must See Him In Misfortune.

Against Attempts On My Life, I Trust In My Luck, My Good Genius, And My Guards.

You Do Not Get Peace By Shouting: Peace. Peace Is A Meaningless Word; What We Need Is A Glorious Peace.

I Have Made All The Calculations; Fate Will Do The Rest.

An Army Marches On Its Stomach.

A Man Becomes The Creature Of His Uniform.

When I Was Happy I Thought I Knew Men, But It Was Fated That I Should Know Them In Misfortune Only.

The Inevitable End Of Multiple Chiefs Is That They Fade And Disappear For Lack Of Unity.

There Is No Nation However Small Which Had The Right To Set Itself Free, That Has Not Rescued Itself From The Dishonour Of Obeying The Prince Imposed By An Enemy In The Hour Of Victory.

Man, Not Men, Is The Most Important Consideration.

Rigorous Authority And Justice Are The Kindness Of Kings.

A Nation Recruits Men More Easily Than It Can Retrieve Its Honour.

Valor Is A Gift. Those Having It Never Know For Sure Whether They Have It Till The Test Comes. And Those Having It In One Test Never Know For Sure If They Will Have It When The Next Test Comes.

Those Who Failed To Oppose Me, Who Readily Agreed With Me And Accepted All My Views, Were Those Who Did Me The Most Injury.

There Are Only Two Forces That Unite Men - Fear And Interest.

If You Build An Army Of 100 Lions And Their Leader Is A Dog, In Any Fight, The Lions Will Die Like A Dog. But If You Build An Army Of 100 Dogs And Their Leader Is A Lion, All Dogs Will Fight As A Lion

To Extraordinary Circumstance We Must Apply Extraordinary Remedies.

War,--the Trade Of Barbarians!

Destiny Urges Me To A Goal Of Which I Am Ignorant. Until That Goal Is Attained I Am Invulnerable, Unassailable. When Destiny Has Accomplished Her Purpose In Me, A Fly May Suffice To Destroy Me.

I Love A Brave Soldier Who Has Undergone The Baptism Of Fire.

An Army Must Have But One Line Of Operations. This Must Be Maintained With Care And Abandoned Only For Major Reasons.

I Pay Attention Only To What People Do Or Say. I Never Pay Attention To What They Think.

The Laws Of Circumstance Are Abolished By New Circumstances.

Collective Crimes Incriminate No One.

Unhappy The General Who Comes On The Field Of Battle With A System.

The Leader's Role Is To Define Reality, Then Give Hope

There Is Only One Favorable Moment In War; Talent Consists In Knowing How To Seize It.

In Revolution There Are Only Two Sorts Of Men, Those Who Cause Them And Those Who Profit By Them.

Human Life Is The Only Thing That Takes Care Of Itself.

He Who Fears Being Conquered Is Sure Of Defeat.

I Believe Love To Be Hurtful To Society, And To The Individual Happiness Of Men. I Believe, In Short, That Love Does More Harm Than Good.

Republican Despotism Is More Fertile In Acts Of Tyranny, Because Everyone Has A Hand In It.

A Cowardly Act! What Do I Care About That? You May Be Sure That I Should Never Fear To Commit One If It Were To My Advantage.

The Nature Of Christ Is, I Grant It, From One End To Another, A Web Of Mysteries; But This Mysteriousness Does Not Correspond To The Difficulties Which All Existence Contains. Let It Be Rejected, And The Whole World Is An Enigma; Let It Be Accepted, And We Possess A Wonderful Explanation Of The History Of Man.

I Marvel That Whereas The Ambitious Dreams Of My Self, Caesar, And Alexander Should Have Vanished Into Thin Air, A Judean Peasant-jesus-s Hould Be Able To Stretch His Hands Across The Centuries And Control The Destinies Of Men And Nations.

My Business Is To Succeed, And I’m Good At It. I Create My Iliad By My Actions, Create It Day By Day.

In War There Is But One Favorable Moment; The Great Art Is To Seize It!

The First Method Is That Of A Schemer And Leads Only To Mediocre Results; The Other Method Is The Path Of Genius And Changes The Face Of The World.

The More I Study The World, The More I Am Convinced Of The Inability Of Brute Force To Create Anything Durable.

When Small Men Attempt Great Enterprises, They Always End By Reducing Them To The Level Of Their Mediocrity.

Never Depend On The Multitude, Full Of Instability And Whims; Always Take Precautions Against It.

This Year Has Begun Hopefully For Right Thinkers. After All These Centuries Of Feudal Barbarism And Political Slavery, It Is Surprising To See How The Word Of 'liberty' Sets Minds On Fire.

The Man Fitted For Affairs And Authority Never Considers Individuals, But Things And Their Consequences.

Circumstances-what Are Circumstances? I Make Circumstances

Variety Made The Revolution. Liberty Was Just A Pretext.

Never Ascribe To Malice That Which Is Adequately Explained By Stupidity.

Remember That A Man, A True Man, Never Hates. His Rages And His Bad Moods Never Last Beyond The Present Moment-like Electric Shocks.

It Is Cowardly To Commit Suicide. The English Often Kill Themselves. It Is A Malady Caused By The Humid Climate.

It Is In Times Of Difficulty That Great Nations Like Great Men Display The Whole Energy Of Their Character And Become An Object Of Admiration To Posterity.

Let France Have Good Mothers, And She Will Have Good Sons.

War Is A Lottery In Which Nations Ought To Risk Nothing But Small Amounts.

Sometimes A Great Example Is Necessary To All The Public Functionaries Of The State.

Great Men Are Never Cruel Without Necessity.

Every Private In The French Army Carries A Field Marshall Wand In His Knapsack.

Let Her Sleep, For When She Wakes, She Will Shake The World.

Posterity Will Talk Of Washington As The Founder Of A Great Empire, When My Name Shall Be Lost In The Vortex Of Revolution.

The Truest Wisdom Is A Resolute Determination.

You May Ask Me For Anything You Like Except Time.

An Army's Effectiveness Depends On Its Size, Training, Experience, And Morale, And Morale Is Worth More Than Any Of The Other Factors Combined.

One Must Change One's Tactics Every Ten Years If One Wishes To Maintain One's Superiority.

Of All The Peoples Of Europe, Spaniards Disgust Me The Least.

Arabia Was Idolatrous When, Six Centuries After Jesus, Muhammad Introduced The Worship Of The God Of Abraham, Of Ishmael, Of Moses, And Jesus. The Ariyans And Some Other Sects Had Disturbed The Tranquility Of The East By Agitating The Question Of The Nature Of The Father, The Son, And The Holy Ghost. Muhammad Declared That There Was None But One God Who Had No Father, No Son And That The Trinity Imported The Idea Of Idolatry.

At The Head Of An Army, Nothing Is More Becoming Than Simplicity.

In Our Time No One Has The Conception Of What Is Great. It Is Up To Me To Show Them.

Large Legislative Bodies Resolve Themselves Into Coteries, And Coteries Into Jealousies.

Washington Is Dead! This Great Man Fought Against Tyranny; He Established The Liberty Of His Country. His Memory Will Always Be Dear To The French People, As It Will Be To All Free Men Of The Two Worlds; And Especially To French Soldiers, Who, Like Him And The American Soldiers, Have Combated For Liberty And Equality.

England Would Be Better Off Without Canada; It Keeps Her In A Prepared State For War At A Great Expense And Constant Irritation.

Has A Man The Right To Kill Himself? Yes, If His Death Harms No One And If Life Is An Evil To Him. When Is Life An Evil? When It Offers A Man Nothing But Suffering And Pain.

In War, As In Politics, No Evil - Even If It Is Permissible Under The Rules - Is Excusable Unless It Is Absolutely Necessary. Everything Beyond That Is A Crime.

Equality Should Be The Chief Basis Of The Education Of Youth.

I Have So Often Been Mistaken That I No Longer Blush For It

The Hand That Gives Is Among The Hand That Takes. Money Has No Fatherland, Financiers Are Without Patriotism And Without Decency, Their Sole Object Is Gain.

I Have Noticed In Every Campaign That I Have Fought-that There Is A Key Segment Of Time, Somewhere Between 13 And 15 Minutes In Which The Battle Is Won Or Lost. I Focus On That Segment Of Time, And I Win.

Whatever Misanthropists May Say, Ingrates And The Perverse Are Exceptions In The Human Species.

People Take England On Trust, And Repeat That Shakespeare Is The Greatest Of All Authors. I Have Read Him: There Is Nothing That Compares Racine Or Corneille: His Plays Are Unreadable, Pitiful.

The Affairs Of War, Like The Destiny Of Battles, As Well As Empires, Hang Upon A Spiders Thread.

Send Me 300 Francs; That Sum Will Enable Me To Go To Paris. There, At Least, One Can Cut A Figure And Surmount Obstacles. Everything Tells Me I Shall Succeed. Will You Prevent Me From Doing So For The Want Of 100 Crowns?

To Write History One Must Be More Than A Man, Since The Author Who Holds The Pen Of This Great Justiciary Must Be Free From All Preoccupation Of Interest Or Vanity.

Timid And Cowardly Soldiers Cause The Loss Of A Nation's Independence; But Pusillanimous Magistrates Destroy The Empire Of The Laws, The Rights Of The Throne, And Even Social Order Itself.

The Greatest Danger Occurs At The Moment Of Victory

The Worse The Man, The Better The Soldier.

History Is A Myth That Men Agree To Believe.

It Is The Success Which Makes Great Men.

Congratulations

A Man Occupied With Public Or Other Important Business Cannot, And Need Not, Attend To Spelling.

The People To Fear Are Not Those Who Disagree With You, But Those Who Disagree With You And Are Too Cowardly To Let You Know.

It Is Cowardice To Commit Suicide.

Every Beggar Shall Be Arrested. But To Arrest A Beggar Merely In Order To Put Him In Jail Would Be Barbarous And Absurd. He Should Be Arrested For The Sole Purpose Of Teaching Him How To Earn A Living By His Work.

Promptly Improve Your Accidents.

I Do Not Amuse Myself By Thinking Of Dead People.

There Are Certain Things In War Of Which The Commander Alone Comprehends The Importance. Nothing But His Superior Firmness And Ability Can Subdue And Surmount All Difficulties.

A Well-composed Song Strikes The Mind And Softens The Feelings, And Produces A Greater Effect Than A Moral Work, Which Convinces Our Reason, But Does Not Warm Our Feelings, Nor Effect The Slightest Alteration In Our Habits

You Cannot Drag A Man's Conscience Before Any Tribunal, And No One Is Answerable For His Religious Opinions To Any Power On Earth.

An Empty Throne Always Tempts Me.

Man Is Entitled By Birthright To A Share Of The Earth's Produce Sufficient To Fill The Needs Of His Existence.

It Is Necessary For The Heart To Feel As For The Body To Be Fed.

Europe Is A Molehill. All Great Empires And Revolutions Have Been On The Orient; Six Hundred Millions Live There.

We Must Laugh At Man To Avoid Crying For Him.

The Advance And Perfecting Of Mathematics Are Closely Joined To The Prosperity Of The Nation.

While I Live I Will Never Resort To Irredeemable Paper.

To Command, You Must First Of All Speak To The Eyes.

That Man Made Me Miss My Destiny.

The Public Spirit Is In The Hands Of The Man Who Knows How To Make Use Of It.

Two Armies Are Two Bodies Which Meet And Try To Frighten Each Other.

The Jesuits Are A Military Organization, Not A Religious Order. Their Chief Is A General Of An Army, Not The Mere Father Abbot Of A Monastery. And The Aim Of This Organization Is Power - Power In Its Most Despotic Exercise - Absolute Power, Universal Power, Power To Control The World By The Volition Of A Single Man. Jesuitism Is The Most Absolute Of Despotisms - And At The Same Time The Greatest And Most Enormous Of Abuses.

There Are Two Kinds Of Fidelity, That Of Dogs And That Of Cats; You, Gentleman, Have The Fidelity Of Cats Who Never Leave The House.

In War, As In Prostitution, Amateurs Are Often Better Than Professionals.

Put A Rogue In The Limelight And He Will Act Like An Honest Man.

In War As In Love, To Bring Matters To A Close, You Must Get Close Together.

Nothing Is More Difficult, And Therefore More Precious, Than To Be Able To Decide.

True Character Stands The Test Of Emergencies. Do Not Be Mistaken, It Is Weakness From Which The Awakening Is Rude.

Ten People Who Speak Make More Noise Than Ten Thousand Who Are Silent.

It Is Not Necessary To Bury The Truth. It Is Sufficient Merely To Delay It Until Nobody Cares.

A People That Is Able To Say Everything, Becomes Able To Do Everything. The Crowd Which Follows Me With Admiration, Would Run With The Same Eagerness Were I Marching To The Guillotine.

Nothing Is More Destructive Than The Charge Of Artillery On A Crowd.

Between A Battle Lost And A Battle Won, The Distance Is Immense And There Stand Empires.

An Urgent Missive Sent To Josephine Home In Three Days. Don't Wash.

I Generally Had To Give In.

A Man Is Known By His Conduct To His Wife, To His Family, And To Those Under Him.

To Understand The Man You Have To Know What Was Happening In The World When He Was Twenty.

There Is No Man More Pusillanimous Than I When I Am Planning A Campaign. I Purposely Exaggerate All The Dangers And All The Calamities That The Circumstances Make Possible. I Am In A Thoroughly Painful State Of Agitation. This Does Not Keep Me From Looking Quite Serene In Front Of My Entourage; I Am Like An Unmarried Girl Laboring With Child. Once I Have Made Up My Mind, Everything Is Forgotten Except What Leads To Success.

In A Conquered Country Benevolence Is Not Humanitarianism. It Is A General Political Axiom That A Conqueror Must Not Inspire A Good Opinion Of His Benevolence Until He Has Demonstrated That He Can Be Severe With Malefactors.

No Amount Of Money Will Induce Someone To Lay Down Their Life, But They Will Gladly Do So For A Bit Of Yellow Ribbon.

Muhammad Was A Prince; He Rallied His Compatriots Around Him. In A Few Years, The Muslims Conquered Half Of The World. They Plucked More Souls From False Gods, Knocked Down More Idols, Razed More Pagan Temples In Fifteen Years Than The Followers Of Moses And Jesus Did In Fifteen Centuries. Muhammad Was A Great Man. He Would Indeed Have Been A God, If The Revolution That He Had Performed Had Not Been Prepared By The Circumstances.

Do You Know What Astonished Me The Most In This World? The Inability Of Force To Create Anything.

The Great Art Of Governing Consists In Not Letting Men Grow Old In Their Jobs.

In The Last Analysis, One Must Be A Military Man In Order To Govern. It Is Only With Boot And Spurs That One Can Govern A Horse.

Unity Of Command Is Essential To The Economy Of Time. Warfare In The Field Was Like A Siege: By Directing All One's Force To A Single Point A Breach Might Be Made, And The Equilibrium Of Opposition Destroyed.

The Fool Has One Great Advantage Over A Man Of Sense; He Is Always Satisfied With Himself.

For Today, We Celebrate The First Glorious Anniversary Of The Information Purification Directives. We Have Created, For The First Time In All History, A Garden Of Pure Ideology. Where Each Worker May Bloom Secure From The Pests Of Contradictory And Confusing Truths. Our Unification Of Thought Is More Powerful A Weapon Than Any Fleet Or Army On Earth. We Are One People. With One Will. One Resolve. One Cause. Our Enemies Shall Talk Themselves To Death. And We Will Bury Them With Their Own Confusion. We Shall Prevail!

Men, In General, Are But Great Children.

Once You Have Made Up Your Mind, Stick To It; There Is No Longer Any 'if' Or 'but'.

Democracy May Become Frenzied, But It Has Feelings And Can Be Moved. As For Aristocracy, It Is Always Cold And Never Forgives.

There Is No Real Force Without Justice.

Power Is Founded Upon Opinion.

The Tools Belong To The Man Who Can Use Them.

The Worse The Troops The Greater The Need Of Artillery.

Sometimes A Single Battle Decides Everything And Sometimes, Too, The Slightest Circumstance Decides The Issue Of A Battle. There Is A Moment In Every Battle At Which The Least Manoeuvre Is Decisive And Gives Superiority, As One Drop Of Water Causes Overflow.

If I Were To Give Liberty To The Press, My Power Could Not Last Three Days.

Why And How Are Words So Important That They Cannot Be Too Often Used.

A Celebrated People Lose Dignity Upon A Closer View.

My Waking Thoughts Are All Of Thee. Your Portrait And The Remembrance Of Last Night's Delirium Have Robbed My Senses Of Repose. Sweet And Incomparable Josephine, What An Extraordinary Influence You Have Over My Heart. Are You Vexed? Do I See You Sad? Are You Ill At Ease? My Soul Is Broken With Grief, And There Is No Rest For Your Lover.

The Act Of Policing Is, In Order To Punish Less Often, To Punish More Severely.

I Like Honest Men Of All Colors.

The Confidence With Which A Sovereign Is Invested, Is Solid Only When It Is Sanctioned By The Suffrages Of The People, Who Clothed Him With The Supreme Magistracy.

In War, Moral Factors Acount For Three Quarters Of The Whole; Relative Material Strength Accounts For Only One Quarter.

I Know Men, And I Tell You, Jesus Is More Than A Man. Comparison Is Impossible Between Him And Any Other Human Being Who Ever Lived, Because He Was The Son Of God.

The Worse The Man The Better The Soldier. If Soldiers Be Not Corrupt They Ought To Be Made So.

Called To The Throne By The Voice Of The People, My Maxim Has Always Been: A Career Open To Talent Without Distinction Of Birth. It Is This System Of Equality For Which The European Oligarchy Detests Me

Every Hour Of Lost Time Is A Chance Of Future Misfortune.

Until Then, Mio Dolce Amor, A Thousand Kisses; But Give Me None In Return, For They Set My Blood On Fire.

In Statesmanship There Are Predicaments From Which It Is Impossible To Escape Without Some Wrongdoing.

Our Hour Is Marked, And No One Can Claim A Moment Of Life Beyond What Fate Has Predestined.

Men Are Moved By Two Levers Only: Fear And Self Interest.

The Allied Powers Having Proclaimed That The Emperor Napoleon Is The Sole Obstacle To The Re-establishment Of Peace In Europe, He, Faithful To His Oath, Declares That He Is Ready To Descend From The Throne, To Quit France, And Even To Relinquish Life, For The Good Of His Country.

Society Cannot Exist Without Inequality Of Fortunes And The Inequality Of Fortunes Could Not Subsist Without Religion. Whenever A Half-starved Person Is Near Another Who Is Glutted, It Is Impossible To Reconcile The Difference If There Is Not An Authority Who Tells Him To.

There Is No Such Thing As An Accident, Only A Failure To Recognise The Hand Of Fate

My Dominion Ends Where That Of Conscience Begins.

Men Are Never Attached To You By Favours.

I Have Never Loved Anyone For Love's Sake Except, Perhaps, Josephine - A Little.

My Enemies Make Appointments At My Tomb.

I Don't Employ Talleyrand When I Want A Thing Done, But Only When I Want To Have The Appearance Of Wanting To Do It.

Never Interfere With An Enemy In The Process Of Destroying Himself.

In Order To Govern, The Question Is Not To Follow Out A More Or Less Valid Theory But To Build With Whatever Materials Are At Hand. The Inevitable Must Be Accepted And Turned To Advantage.

Malice Delights To Blacken The Characters Of Prominent Men.

True Wisdom, In General, Consists In Energetic Determination.

Oh Man, Man. How Despicable In Slavery, How Great When Fired With The Love Of Freedom!

War Is The Business Of Barbarians.

From Triumph To Downfall There Is But One Step. I Have Noted That, In The Most Momentous Occasions, Mere Nothings Have Always Decided The Outcome Of The Greatest Events.

The Bible Is No Mere Book, But A Living Creature, With A Power That Conquers All That Oppose It.

It Is Only With Prudence, Sagacity, And Much Dexterity That Great Aims Are Accomplished, And All Obstacles Surmounted. Otherwise Nothing Is Accomplished.

The Most Desirable Quality In A Soldier Is Constancy In The Support Of Fatigue; Valor Is Only Secondary.

In Matters Of Government, Justice Means Force As Well As Virtue.

Clever Policy Consists In Making Nations Believe They Are Free.

Revolutions Are Like The Most Noxious Dungheaps, Which Bring Into Life The Noblest Vegetables.

The Herd Seek Out The Great, Not For Their Sake But For Their Influence; And The Great Welcome Them Out Of Vanity Or Need.

International Incidents Must Not Be Allowed To Shape Foreign Policy, Foreign Policy Must Shape The Incidents.

The Infectiousness Of Crime Is Like That Of The Plague.

Leaders Have To Be Dealers In Hope.

We Frustrate Many Designs Against Us By Pretending Not To See Them.

Great Men Grow Tired Of Contentedness.

A Commander In Chief Ought To Say To Himself Several Times A Day: If The Enemy Should Appear On My Front, On My Right, On My Left, What Would I Do? And If The Question Finds Him Uncertain, He Is Not Well Placed, He Is Not As He Should Be, And He Should Remedy It.

Victory Belongs To The Most Persevering.

When Your Enemy Is Doing Something Wrong, Do Not Interrupt Him.

Brave Deeds Are The Monuments Of Brave Men.

Great Battles Are Won With Artillery.

Conquests Will Come And Go But Delambre's Work Will Endure.

Act Swiftly And Vigorously, Without 'buts' And 'ifs'.

I Am Conquered Less By Fortune Than By The Egotism And Ingratitude Of My Companions In Arms.

Rashness Succeeds Often, Still More Often Fails.

It Is Easier To Brave And Threaten, Than To Conquer An Enemy.

A Faithful Friend Is The True Image Of The Deity.

What Is History But A Fable Agreed Upon?

Writing History

In War One Must Lean On An Obstacle In Order To Overcome It.

Forethought We May Have, Undoubtedly, But Not Foresight.

There Is No Class Of People So Hard To Manage In A State, As Those Whose Intentions Are Honest, But Whose Consciences Are Bewitched.

Patriotism Is A Word Which Represents A Noble Idea.

Incidents Should Not Govern Policy; But, Policy Incidents.

My True Glory Is Not To Have Won 40 Battles ... Waterloo Will Erase The Memory Of So Many Victories, ... But ... What Will Live Forever, Is My Civil Code.

Women Are Nothing But Machines For Producing Children.

All Great Events Hang By A Single Thread. The Clever Man Takes Advantage Of Everything, Neglects Nothing That May Give Him Some Added Opportunity; The Less Clever Man, By Neglecting One Thing, Sometimes Misses Everything.

Trending Author

Daniel Pinkwater

Walter De La Mare

Florence Griffith Joyner

Category