A leader is a dealer in hope.
The human race is governed by its imagination.
Skepticism is a virtue in history as well as in philosophy.
Men are more easily governed through their vices than through their virtues.
He who knows how to flatter also knows how to slander.
What is history but a fable agreed upon?
Power is my mistress. I have worked too hard at her conquest to allow anyone to take her away from me.
The best way to keep one's word is not to give it.
Religion is excellent stuff for keeping common people quiet.
If they want peace, nations should avoid the pin-pricks that precede cannon shots.
Respect the burden.
Glory is fleeting, but obscurity is forever.
A soldier will fight long and hard for a bit of colored ribbon.
When small men attempt great enterprises, they always end by reducing them to the level of their mediocrity.
To do all that one is able to do, is to be a man to do all that one would like to do, is to be a god.
The first virtue in a soldier is endurance of fatigue courage is only the second virtue.
The great proof of madness is the disproportion of one's designs to one's means.
Death is nothing, but to live defeated and inglorious is to die daily.
I am sometimes a fox and sometimes a lion. The whole secret of government lies in knowing when to be the one or the other.
Women are nothing but machines for producing children.
If I had to choose a religion, the sun as the universal giver of life would be my god.
History is the version of past events that people have decided to agree upon.
Take time to deliberate, but when the time for action has arrived, stop thinking and go in.
The best cure for the body is a quiet mind.
One should never forbid what one lacks the power to prevent.
It requires more courage to suffer than to die.
It is the cause, not the death, that makes the martyr.
The truest wisdom is a resolute determination.
Music is the voice that tells us that the human race is greater than it knows.
A picture is worth a thousand words.
All religions have been made by men.
History is a set of lies agreed upon.
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.
The strong man is the one who is able to intercept at will the communication between the senses and the mind.
Religion is what keeps the poor from murdering the rich.
Men take only their needs into consideration - never their abilities.
The herd seek out the great, not for their sake but for their influence and the great welcome them out of vanity or need.
There is one kind of robber whom the law does not strike at, and who steals what is most precious to men: time.
In politics... never retreat, never retract... never admit a mistake.
One must change one's tactics every ten years if one wishes to maintain one's superiority.
Doctors will have more lives to answer for in the next world than even we generals.
In politics stupidity is not a handicap.
Imagination rules the world.
If you wish to be a success in the world, promise everything, deliver nothing.