Called to the throne by the voice of the people, my maxim has always been: A career open to talent without distinction of birth. It is this system of equality for which the European oligarchy detests me

Orders and decorations are necessary in order to dazzle the people.

I wish I could take a raincheck on June 18.1815

We should wash our dirty linen at home.

After me, the Revolution - or, rather the ideas which formed it - will resume their course. It will be like a book from which the marker is removed, and one starts to read again at the page where one left off.

Alexander, Caesar, Charlemagne, and I have founded empires. But on what did we rest the creations of our genius? Upon force. Jesus Christ founded his empire upon love; and at this hour millions of men would die for him.

It is not necessary to bury the truth. It is sufficient merely to delay it until nobody cares.