Variety made the Revolution. Liberty was just a pretext.

Whatever misanthropists may say, ingrates and the perverse are exceptions in the human species.

People take England on trust, and repeat that Shakespeare is the greatest of all authors. I have read him: there is nothing that compares Racine or Corneille: his plays are unreadable, pitiful.

Wisdom and policy dictate that we must do as destiny demands and keep peace with the irresistible march of events.

I am sometimes a fox and sometimes a lion. The whole secret of government lies in knowing when to be the one or the other.

France will always be a great nation.

The affairs of war, like the destiny of battles, as well as empires, hang upon a spiders thread.