Be audacious and cunning in your plans, firm and persevering in their execution, determined to find a glorious end.

The backbone of surprise is fusing speed with secrecy.

War is a conflict of great interests which is settled by bloodshed, and only in that is it different from others.

The heart of France lies between Brussels and Paris.

[...] to introduce into the philosophy of war itself a principle of moderation would be an absurdity

Every combat is the bloody and destructive measuring of the strength of forces, physical and moral; whoever at the close has the greatest amount of both left is the conqueror.

War is only caused through the political intercourse of governments and nations - war is nothing but a continuation of political intercourse with an admixture of other means.