Architects and painters know precisely what they are about as long as they deal with material phenomena.... But when they come to the aesthetics of their work, when they aim at a particular effect on the mind or on the senses, the rules dissolve into nothing but vague ideas.

Boldness governed by superior intellect is the mark of a hero.

Politics is the womb in which war develops - where its outlines already exist in their hidden rudimentary form, like the characteristics of living creatures in their embryos.

Close combat, man to man, is plainly to be regarded as the real basis of combat.

The difficulty of accurate recognition constitutes one of the most serious sources of friction in war, by making things appear entirely different from what one had expected.

In war everything is simple, but it's the simple things that are difficult.

War is merely a continuation of politics.