You must never assume that what people say or do in a particular moment is a statement of their permanent desires. - Robert Greene

Power is a game, and in games you do not judge your opponents by their intentions but by the effects of their actions.

So much of power is not what you do but what you do not do — the rash and foolish actions that you refrain from before they get you into trouble.

The real poetry and beauty in life comes from an intense relationship with reality in all its aspects. Realism is in fact the ideal we must aspire to, the highest point of human rationality.