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Bonaparte Quotes

Browse 33 quotes about Bonaparte.

Bonaparte Quotes

“Ce siècle avait deux ans ! Rome remplaçait Sparte, Déjà Napoléon perçait sous Bonaparte, Et du premier consul, déjà, par maint endroit, Le front de l'empereur brisait le masque étroit. Alors dans Besançon, vieille ville espagnole, Jeté comme la graine au gré de l'air qui vole, Naquit d'un sang breton et lorrain à la fois Un enfant sans couleur, sans regard et sans voix ; Si débile qu'il fut, ainsi qu'une chimère, Abandonné de tous, excepté de sa mère, Et que son cou ployé comme un frêle roseau Fit faire en même temps sa bière et son berceau. Cet enfant que la vie effaçait de son livre, Et qui n'avait pas même un lendemain à vivre, C'est moi. -”

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Book:Les Orientales - Les Feuilles d'automne
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“- Oh ! Franz, ce que tu peux être poule mouillée parois ! Tu n’as donc pas envie de participer à ce grand bouleversement qui se prépare, de sortir de ta cage, de prendre ton envol ? Rappelle-toi que tu es le fils d’un Aigle ! Où sont tes ailes ? - Je ne suis pas le fils d’un Aigle, mais d’un vautour, qui pendant vingt ans s’est nourri de cadavres. Du moins c’est ainsi qu’on me le présente ici.”

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Book:La Dame Blanche
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“- Oh ! Franz, ce que tu peux être poule mouillée parfois ! Tu n’as donc pas envie de participer à ce grand bouleversement qui se prépare, de sortir de ta cage, de prendre ton envol ? Rappelle-toi que tu es le fils d’un Aigle ! Où sont tes ailes ? - Je ne suis pas le fils d’un Aigle, mais d’un vautour, qui pendant vingt ans s’est nourri de cadavres. Du moins c’est ainsi qu’on me le présente ici.”

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Book:La Dame Blanche
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“France, freed from that monster, Bonaparte, must again become the most agreeable country on earth. It would be the second choice of all whose ties of family and fortune give a preference to some other one, and the first choice of all not under those ties.”

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Book:The writings of Thomas Jefferson: being his autobiography, correspondence, reports, messages, addresses, and other writings, official and private : published by the order of the Joint Committee of Congress on the Library, from the original manuscripts, deposited in the Department of State
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“It would scarcely be destruction," he replied gently. "Let us call it iconoclasm, the swallowing of formulas, which has always had its full retinue of idealists. And you do not want a Napoleon . All that is needed is direction, which could be given by men of far lower gifts than a Bonaparte. In a word, you want a Power-House, and then the age of miracles will begin.”

MenWantAgeHouseGivenNeededDestructionMiracleFormulasIdealistSwallowingBonaparteIconoclasm
Book:The Complete Works of John Buchan (Unabridged): Thriller Classics, Spy Novels, Supernatural Tales, Short Stories, Poetry, Historical Works, The Great War Writings, Essays, Biographies & Memoirs – All in One Volume
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“Our faith in democracy, personal freedoms and human 'rights', and the other comforting prescriptions of the humanist liberal credo stem from the supremacy of maritime over territorial power. Pragmatists may deplore this as crude determinism, as another vain attempt to construct a general theory of history. They should reflect on the sort of political philosophy and structures we might now adhere to had the Habsburgs, Bourbons, Bonaparte, Hitler, Stalin or his heirs prevailed in the titanic world struggles of the past four centuries.”

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Book:Maritime Supremacy & the Opening of the Western Mind: Naval Campaigns that Shaped the Modern World
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“Was it possible that Napoleon should win the battle of Waterloo? We answer, No! Why? Because of Wellington? Because of Blucher? No! Because of God! For Bonaparte to conquer at Waterloo was not the law of the nineteenth century. It was time that this vast man should fall. He had been impeached before the Infinite! He had vexed God! Waterloo was not a battle. It was the change of front of the Universe!”

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Author:Victor Hugo
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“We must evaluate the political sympathies of other states and the effect war may have on them. To assess these things in all their ramifications and diversity is plainly a colossal task. Rapid and correct appraisal of them clearly calls for the intuition of a genius; to master all this complex mass by sheer methodical examination is obviously impossible. Bonaparte was quite right when he said that Newton himself would quail before the algebraic problems it could pose.”

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Author:Carl von Clausewitz
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“We believe no more in Bonaparte's fighting merely for the liberties of the seas than in Great Britain's fighting for the liberties of mankind. The object is the same, to draw to themselves the power, the wealth and the resources of other nations.”

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Book:The Works of Thomas Jefferson: Correspondence and Papers, 1808-1816
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“[Wise men] have tried to understand our state of being, by grasping at its stars, or its arts, or its economics. But, if there is an underlying oneness of all things, it does not matter where we begin, whether with stars, or laws of supply and demand, or frogs, or Napoleon Bonaparte. One measures a circle, beginning anywhere.”

IfsMenDoeArtMatterStatesLawStarsWiseDemandEconomicsAll ThingsCirclesOnenessFrogsGraspingSupply And DemandBonaparte
Book:Lo!
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“This soldier, I realized, must have had friends at home and in his regiment; yet he lay there deserted by all except his dog. I looked on, unmoved, at battles which decided the future of nations. Tearless, I had given orders which brought death to thousands. Yet here I was stirred, profoundly stirred, stirred to tears. And by what? By the grief of one dog. Napoleon Bonaparte, on finding a dog beside the body of his dead master, licking his face and howling, on a moonlit field after a battle. Napoleon was haunted by this scene until his own death.”

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Author:Napoleon Bonaparte
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“Youth is terrible: it is a stage trod by children in buskins and a variety of costumes mouthing speeches they've memorized and fanatically believe but only half understand. And history is terrible because it so often ends up a playground for the immature; a playground for the young Nero, a playground for the young Bonaparte, a playground for the easily roused mobs of children whose simulated passions and simplistic poses suddenly metamorphose into a catastrophically real reality.”

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Author:Milan Kundera
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“During a frustrating argument with a Roman Catholic cardinal, Napoleon Bonaparte supposedly burst out: “Your eminence, are you not aware that I have the power to destroy the Catholic Church?” The cardinal, the anecdote goes, responded ruefully: “Your majesty, we, the Catholic clergy, have done our best to destroy the church for the last 1,800 years. We have not succeeded, and neither will you.””

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Author:Ross Douthat
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“Anyone who clings to the historically untrue-and thoroughly immoral-doctrine that, 'violence never settles anything' I would advise to conjure the ghosts of Napoleon Bonaparte and the Duke of Wellington and let them debate it. The ghost of Hitler could referee, and the jury might well be the Dodo, the Great Auk and the Passenger Pigeon. Violence, naked force, has settled more issues in history than has any other factor, and the contrary opinion is wishful thinking at its worst. Breeds that forget this basic truth have always paid for it with their lives and freedom.”

ThinkingWellsMightForceForgetOpinionIssuesViolenceWorstPaidContraryDebateGhostDoctrineNakedFactorsSettlingImmoralAdviseJuryPassengersUntrueDukesWishful ThinkingPigeonsRefereeNever SettleBonaparteWellington
Book:Starship Troopers
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