Napoleon Bonaparte Quotes
Quotations and aphorisms by Napoleon Bonaparte:
If they want peace, nations should avoid the pin-pricks that precede cannon shots.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
A revolution can be neither made nor stopped. The only thing that can be done is for one of several of its children to give it a direction by dint of victories.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
If you wish to be a success in the world, promise everything, deliver nothing.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
When small men attempt great enterprises, they always end by reducing them to the level of their mediocrity.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
It requires more courage to suffer than to die.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
You must not fear death, my lads; defy him, and you drive him into the enemy's ranks.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
The truest wisdom is a resolute determination.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
The great proof of madness is the disproportion of one's designs to one's means.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
The human race is governed by its imagination.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
Glory is fleeting, but obscurity is forever.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
A man cannot become an atheist merely by wishing it.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
Ten people who speak make more noise than ten thousand who are silent.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
History is a set of lies agreed upon.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
Men are more easily governed through their vices than through their virtues.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
In politics... never retreat, never retract... never admit a mistake.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
In politics stupidity is not a handicap.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
Power is my mistress. I have worked too hard at her conquest to allow anyone to take her away from me.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
From the heights of these pyramids, forty centuries look down on us.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
Ability is nothing without opportunity.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
One should never forbid what one lacks the power to prevent.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
A soldier will fight long and hard for a bit of colored ribbon.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
The surest way to remain poor is to be an honest man.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
France has more need of me than I have need of France.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
I made all my generals out of mud.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
Death is nothing, but to live defeated and inglorious is to die daily.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
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.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
Water, air, and cleanness are the chief articles in my pharmacy.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
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.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
Respect the burden.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
Ambition never is in a greater hurry than I; it merely keeps pace with circumstances and with my general way of thinking.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
Men take only their needs into consideration - never their abilities.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
The first virtue in a soldier is endurance of fatigue; courage is only the second virtue.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
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.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
A throne is only a bench covered with velvet.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
Among those who dislike oppression are many who like to oppress.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
A Constitution should be short and obscure.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
There are only two forces in the world, the sword and the spirit. In the long run the sword will always be conquered by the spirit.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
Soldiers generally win battles; generals get credit for them.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
The herd seek out the great, not for their sake but for their influence; and the great welcome them out of vanity or need.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
A celebrated people lose dignity upon a closer view.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
Throw off your worries when you throw off your clothes at night.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
The battle of Austerlitz is the grandest of all I have fought.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
Religion is excellent stuff for keeping common people quiet.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
Music is the voice that tells us that the human race is greater than it knows.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
Take time to deliberate, but when the time for action has arrived, stop thinking and go in.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
Nothing is more difficult, and therefore more precious, than to be able to decide.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
Forethought we may have, undoubtedly, but not foresight.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
There is no such thing as accident; it is fate misnamed.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
There are only two forces that unite men - fear and interest.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
Four hostile newspapers are more to be feared than a thousand bayonets.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
The infectiousness of crime is like that of the plague.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
The battlefield is a scene of constant chaos. The winner will be the one who controls that chaos, both his own and the enemies.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
I have only one counsel for you - be master.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
The torment of precautions often exceeds the dangers to be avoided. It is sometimes better to abandon one's self to destiny.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
We must laugh at man to avoid crying for him.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
Let the path be open to talent.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
It is the cause, not the death, that makes the martyr.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
The extent of your consciousness is limited only by your ability to love and to embrace with your love the space around you, and all it contains.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
Doctors will have more lives to answer for in the next world than even we generals.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
All religions have been made by men.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
You must not fight too often with one enemy, or you will teach him all your art of war.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
I am the successor, not of Louis XVI, but of Charlemagne.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
When soldiers have been baptized in the fire of a battle-field, they have all one rank in my eyes.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
Religion is what keeps the poor from murdering the rich.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
England is a nation of shopkeepers.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
If you want a thing done well, do it yourself.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
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.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
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.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
The best way to keep one's word is not to give it.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
Men are moved by two levers only: fear and self interest.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
A revolution is an idea which has found its bayonets.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
The best cure for the body is a quiet mind.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
The act of policing is, in order to punish less often, to punish more severely.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
One must change one's tactics every ten years if one wishes to maintain one's superiority.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
A man will fight harder for his interests than for his rights.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
He who fears being conquered is sure of defeat.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
A true man hates no one.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
There is one kind of robber whom the law does not strike at, and who steals what is most precious to men: time.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
War is the business of barbarians.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
With audacity one can undertake anything, but not do everything.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
I can no longer obey; I have tasted command, and I cannot give it up.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
Imagination rules the world.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
Riches do not consist in the possession of treasures, but in the use made of them.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
Courage is like love; it must have hope for nourishment.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
What is history but a fable agreed upon?
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
It is my wish that my ashes may repose on the banks of the Seine, in the midst of the French people, whom I have loved so well.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
A leader is a dealer in hope.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
Women are nothing but machines for producing children.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
There is only one step from the sublime to the ridiculous.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
Impossible is a word to be found only in the dictionary of fools.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
Great ambition is the passion of a great character. Those endowed with it may perform very good or very bad acts. All depends on the principles which direct them.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
He who knows how to flatter also knows how to slander.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
Never interrupt your enemy when he is making a mistake.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
History is the version of past events that people have decided to agree upon.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
Victory belongs to the most persevering.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
An army marches on its stomach.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
The French complain of everything, and always.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
Skepticism is a virtue in history as well as in philosophy.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
The strong man is the one who is able to intercept at will the communication between the senses and the mind.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
If I had to choose a religion, the sun as the universal giver of life would be my god.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
Public opinion is the thermometer a monarch should constantly consult.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
The army is the true nobility of our country.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
Medicines are only fit for old people.
~Napoleon Bonaparte
Link:
Share:
Permalink:
Browse: