Those in possession of absolute power can not only prophesy and make their prophecies come true, but they can also lie and make their lies come true.

Those who feel guilty are afraid; and those who are afraid somehow feel guilty. To the onlooker, too, the fearful seem guilty.

The leader has to be practical and a realist, yet must talk the language of the visionary and the idealist.

A nation without dregs and malcontents is orderly, peaceful and pleasant, but perhaps without the seed of things to come.

There is probably nothing more sublime than discontent transmuted into a work of art, a scientific discovery, and so on.

The hardest thing to cope with is not selfishness or vanity or deceitfulness, but sheer stupidity.

Those who are in love with the present can be cruel and corrupt but not genuinely vicious. They cannot be methodically and consistently ruthless.