Anarchy is the stepping stone to absolute power.
The amateurs discuss tactics: the professionals discuss logistics.
If you build an army of 100 lions and their leader is a dog, in any fight, the lions will die like a dog. But if you build an army of 100 dogs and their leader is a lion, all dogs will fight as a lion.
The battlefield is a scene of constant chaos. The winner will be the one who controls that chaos, both his own and the enemies.
It follows that any commander in chief who undertakes to carry out a plan which he considers defective is at fault; he must put forth his reasons, insist on the plan being changed, and finally tender his resignation rather than be the instrument of h.
It requires more courage to suffer than to die.
The first virtue in a soldier is endurance of fatigue; courage is only the second virtue.
Riches do not consist in the possession of treasures, but in the use made of them.
The greatest danger occurs at the moment of victory.
A soldier will fight long and hard for a bit of colored ribbon.
Medicine is a collection of uncertain prescriptions, the results of which, taken collectively, are more fatal than useful to mankind.
Soldiers generally win battles; generals get credit for them.
Die young, and I shall accept your death-but not if you have lived without glory, without being useful to your country, without leaving a trace of your existence: for that is not to have lived at all.
Until then, mio dolce amor, a thousand kisses; but give me none in return, for they set my blood on fire.
Ability is nothing without opportunity.
I have made noise enough in the world already, perhaps too much, and am now getting old, and want retirement.
What is a throne? – a bit of wood gilded and covered in velvet. I am the state- I alone am here the representative of the people. Even if I had done wrong you should not have reproached me in public – people wash their dirty linen at home. France has more need of me than I of France.
Water, air, and cleanness are the chief articles in my pharmacy.
One should never forbid what one lacks the power to prevent.
Time is the great art of man.