Best quotes by Napoleon Bonaparte
Napoleon Bonaparte
French military and political leader
Napoleon Bonaparte (born Napoleone di Buonaparte; 15 August 1769 – 5 May 1821) was a French military and political leader who rose to prominence during the French Revolution and led several successful campaigns during the Revolutionary Wars. He was the de facto leader of the French Republic as First Consul from 1799 to 1804. As Napoleon I, he was Emperor of the French from 1804 until 1814 and again in 1815. Napoleon dominated European and global affairs for more than a decade while leading France against a series of coalitions in the Napoleonic Wars. He won most of these wars and the vast majority of his battles, building a large empire that ruled over continental Europe before its final collapse in 1815. He was one of the greatest military commanders in history, and his wars and campaigns are studied in military schools worldwide. Napoleon's political and cultural legacy has endured, and he has been one of the most celebrated and controversial leaders in world history.
Napoleon was born on the island of Corsica not long after its annexation by the Kingdom of France, and his family "occupied that social penumbra encompassing the haute bourgeoisie and the very minor nobility." He supported the French Revolution in 1789 while serving in the French army, and tried to spread its ideals to his native Corsica. He rose rapidly in the Army after he saved the governing French Directory by firing on royalist insurgents. In April 1796, he began his first military campaign against the Austrians and their Italian allies, scoring a series of decisive victories and becoming a national hero. Two years later, he led a military expedition to Egypt that served as a springboard to political power. He engineered a coup in November 1799 and became First Consul of the Republic. Intractable differences with the British meant that the French were facing the War of the Third Coalition by 1805. Napoleon shattered this coalition with decisive victories in the Ulm Campaign, and a historic triumph at the Battle of Austerlitz, which led to the dissolving of the Holy Roman Empire. In 1806, the Fourth Coalition took up arms against him because Prussia became worried about growing French influence on the continent. Napoleon quickly knocked out Prussia at the battles of Jena and Auerstedt, then marched the Grande Armée deep into Eastern Europe, annihilating the Russians in June 1807 at Friedland, and forcing the defeated nations of the Fourth Coalition to accept the Treaties of Tilsit. Two years later, the Austrians challenged the French again during the War of the Fifth Coalition, but Napoleon solidified his grip over Europe after triumphing at the Battle of Wagram.
Hoping to extend the Continental System (his embargo against Britain), Napoleon invaded the Iberian Peninsula and declared his brother Joseph the King of Spain in 1808. The Spanish and the Portuguese revolted with British support in the Peninsular War, which lasted six years, featured brutal guerrilla warfare, and culminated in a defeat for Napoleon's marshals. Napoleon launched an invasion of Russia in the summer of 1812. The resulting campaign witnessed the catastrophic retreat of Napoleon's Grande Armée and encouraged his enemies. In 1813, Prussia and Austria joined Russian forces in a Sixth Coalition against France. A chaotic military campaign culminated in a large coalition army defeating Napoleon at the Battle of Leipzig in October 1813. The coalition invaded France and captured Paris, forcing Napoleon to abdicate in April 1814. He was exiled to the island of Elba, between Corsica and Italy. Meanwhile, in France, the Bourbons were restored to power. However, Napoleon escaped from Elba in February 1815 and took control of France, "without spilling a drop of blood" as he wished. The Allies responded by forming a Seventh Coalition, which ultimately defeated Napoleon at the Battle of Waterloo in June 1815. The British exiled him to the remote island of Saint Helena in the South Atlantic, where he died in 1821 at the age of 51. Napoleon had an extensive impact on the modern world, bringing liberal reforms to the numerous territories that he conquered and controlled, especially the Low Countries, Switzerland, and large parts of modern Italy and Germany. He implemented fundamental liberal policies in France and throughout Western Europe.
Napoleon Bonaparte quotes by category:
Much shedding of blood, many great actions, and triumphs, toil and perseverance are the end of all things human.
Sometimes a great example is necessary to all the public functionaries of the state.
Rigorous authority and justice are the kindness of kings.
I am the signet which marks the page where the revolution has been stopped; but when I die it will turn the page and resume its course.
A true master of politics is able to calculate, down to the smallest fraction, the advantages to which he may put his very faults.
Men, in general, are but great children.
God is on the side of the heaviest cannon.
There is no strength without justice.
Prison, blood, death, create enthusiasts and martyrs, and bring forth courage and desperate resolution.
We are nothing but by the law.
Where flowers degenerate man cannot live.
In war, the general alone can judge of certain arrangements. It depends on him alone to conquer difficulties by his own superior talents and resolution.
A nation recruits men more easily than it can retrieve its honour.
Paradise is a center whither the souls of all men are proceeding, each sect in its particular road.
It is not by whining that one carries out the job of king.
An empty throne always tempts me.
We are made weak both by idleness and distrust of ourselves. Unfortunate, indeed, is he who suffers from both. If he is a mere individual he becomes nothing; if he is a king he is lost.
War is a lottery in which nations ought to risk nothing but small amounts.
Diplomacy is the police in grand costume.
How many really capable men are children more than once during the day!
We must serve the people worthily, and not occupy ourselves in trying to please them. The best way, to gain their affections is to do them good.
When defending itself against another country, a nation never lacks men, but too often, soldiers.
Kiss the feet of Popes provided their hands are tied.
Character is victory organized.
If obedience is the result of the instinct of the masses, revolt is the result of their thought.
The spectacle of a field of battle after the combat, is sufficient to inspire Princes with the love of peace, and the horror of war.
Here, Gentlemen, a dog teaches us a lesson in humanity.
A man made for public life and authority never takes account of personalities; he only takes account of things, of their weight and their conseqences.
I have seen only yoU, I have admired only yoU, I desire only You
In statesmanship there are predicaments from which it is impossible to escape without some wrongdoing.
Nothing renders a nation so despicable as religious despotism.
Public morals are natural complement of all laws they are by themselves an entire code.
The inevitable end of multiple chiefs is that they fade and disappear for lack of unity.
The fate of a Nation may sometimes depend upon the position of a fortress.
When a man is a favorite of Fortune she never takes him unawares, and, however astonishing her favors may be, she finds him ready.
When you determine to risk a battle, reserve to yourself every possible chance of success, more particularly if you have to deal with an adversary of superior talent, for if you are beaten, even in the midst of your magazines and your communications, woe to the vanquished!
Imagination governs the world.
The most terrible of all my battles was the one before Moscow. The French showed themselves to be worthy of victory, but the Russians showed themselves worthy of being invincible.
Leaders have to be dealers in hope.
In politics nothing is immutable. Events carry within them an invincible power. The unwise destroy themselves in resistance. The skillful accept events, take strong hold of them and direct them.
A revolution can be neither made nor stopped. The only thing that can be done is for one of several of its children to give it a direction by dint of victories.
When soldiers have been baptized in the fire of a battle-field, they have all one rank in my eyes.
One bad general is worth two good ones.
If I had to choose a religion, the sun as the universal giver of life would be my god.
I have destroyed the enemy merely by marches.
We live and die in the midst of marvels.
If they want peace, nations should avoid the pin-pricks that precede cannon shots.
This year has begun hopefully for right thinkers. After all these centuries of feudal barbarism and political slavery, it is surprising to see how the word of 'liberty' sets minds on fire.
Lack is more in means, than in principles.
Power is founded upon opinion.
What is history but a fable agreed upon?
Europe thus divided into nationalities freely formed and free internally, peace between States would have become easier: the United States of Europe would become a possibility.
The laws of circumstance are abolished by new circumstances.
The advance and perfecting of mathematics are closely joined to the prosperity of the nation.
The law, that is what makes men stay honest.
I saw the crown of France laying on the ground, so I picked it up with my sword.
Flatterers and men of learning do not accord well with each other.
In matters of government, justice means force as well as virtue.
In war, groping tactics, half-way measures, lose everything.
The great proof of madness is the disproportion of one's designs to one's means.
There are certain things in war of which the commander alone comprehends the importance. Nothing but his superior firmness and ability can subdue and surmount all difficulties.
Variety made the Revolution. Liberty was just a pretext.
Take a dose of medicine once, and in all probability you will be obliged to take an additional hundred afterwards
We should wash our dirty linen at home.
The fate of war is to be exalted in the morning, and low enough at night! There is but one step from triumph to ruin.
I have doubtless erred more or less in politics, but a crime I never committed.
A Constitution should be short and obscure.
An army must have but one line of operations. This must be maintained with care and abandoned only for major reasons.
Every French soldier carriers a marshal's baton in his knapsack.
Soldiers! Here is the battle you have so long desired! Henceforth victory depends on you; we have need of it.
Liberty and equality are magical words.
A fool is only troublesome, a pedant insupportable.
War is cruel to the people, and terrible to the conquered.
Everything is more or less organized matter. To think so is against religion, but I think so just the same.
Conquests will come and go but Delambre's work will endure.