Be convinced that to be happy means to be free and that to be free means to be brave. Therefore do not take lightly the perils of war.

For men naturally despise those who court them, but respect those who do not give way to them.

Right, as the world goes, is only in question between equals in power, while the strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must.

I think the two things most opposed to good counsel are haste and passion; haste usaully goes hand in hand with folly, passion with coarseness and narrowness of mind.

War is a matter not so much of arms as of money.

With reference to the narrative of events, far from permitting myself to derive it from the first source that came to hand, I did not even trust my own impressions, but it rests partly on what I saw myself, partly on what others saw for me, the accuracy of the report always being tried by the most severe and detailed tests possible. My conclusions have cost me some labour from the want of coincidence between accounts of the same occurrences by different eye-witnesses, arising sometimes from imperfect memory, sometimes from undue partiality for one side or the other.

They are surely to be esteemed the bravest spirits who, having the clearest sense of both the pains and pleasures of life, do not on that account shrink from danger.