Do what you want, but be prepared in that case to be ruled rather than to rule others... Soft countries breed soft men. For it is not possible for th… - Cyrus the Great

Whenever you can, act as a liberator. Freedom, dignity, wealth — these three together constitute the greatest happiness of humanity. If you bequeath all three to your people, their love for you will never die.

Success always calls for greater generosity — though most people, lost in the darkness of their own egos, treat it as an occasion for greater greed. Collecting boot is not an end itself, but only a means for building an empire. Riches would be of little use to us now — except as a means of winning new friends.

From [Babylon] to Aššur and (from) Susa, Agade, Ešnunna, Zamban, Me-Turnu, Der, as far as the region of Gutium, the sacred centers on the other side of the Tigris, whose sanctuaries had been abandoned for a long time, I returned the images of the gods, who had resided there, to their places and I let them dwell in eternal abodes. I gathered all their inhabitants and returned to them their dwellings. In addition, at the command of Marduk, the great lord, I settled in their habitations, in pleasing abodes, the gods of Sumer and Akkad, whom Nabonidus, to the anger of the lord of the gods, had brought into Babylon.