Napoleon Quotes

Un bon croquis vaut mieux qu'un long discours.

If I were an Englishman, I should esteem the man who advised a war with China to be the greatest living enemy of my country. You would be beaten in the end, and perhaps a revolution in India would follow.

Waterloo will wipe out the memory of my forty victories; but that which nothing can wipe out is my Civil Code. That will live forever.

Morality has nothing to do with such a man as I am.

You must not fear death, my lads; defy him, and you drive him into the enemy's ranks.

Surely in a matter of this kind we should endeavor to do something, that we may say that we have not lived in vain, that we may leave some impress of ourselves on the sands of time.

I shall bring the nobles of this court so low they shall be obliged to beg their bred.

Each state claims the right to control interests foreign to itself when those interests are such that it can control them without putting its own interests in danger. ... other powers only recognize this right of intervening in proportion as the country doing it has the power to do it.

Europe has its history, often tragic, though at intervals consoling. But to speak of any universally recognized national rights or that these rights have played any part in its history, is to play with the powers of public credulity. Always the first duty of a state has been its safety; the pledge of its safety, its power; and the limits of its power, that intelligence of which each has been made the depository. When the great powers have proclaimed any other principle, it has been only for their own purposes, and the smaller powers have never received any benefit from it.

Europe is a molehill. It has never had any great empires, like those of the Orient, numbering six hundred million souls.

Turks can be killed, but they can never be conquered.

If you give me an army of Turks, I can take the whole world hostage.

France will always be a great nation.

The sentiment of national honor is never more than half extinguished in the French. It takes only a spark to re-kindle it.

In France, only the impossible is admired.