"Bonaparte robs a nation of its independence: deposed as emperor, he is sent into exile, where the world's anxiety still does not think him safely enough imprisoned, guarded by the Ocean. He dies: the news proclaimed on the door of the palace in front of which the conqueror had announced so many funerals, neither detains nor astonishes the passer-by: what have the citizens to mourn? Washington's Republic lives on; Bonaparte's empire is destroyed. Washington and Bonaparte emerged from the womb of democracy: both of them born to liberty, the former remained faithful to her, the latter betrayed her."

"One asks oneself by what sleight of hand Bonaparte, who was so much the aristocrat, who hated the people so cordially, has been able to obtain the popularity which he enjoys. For there is no gainsaying the fact that this subjugator has remained popular with a nation which once made it a point of honour to raise altars to independence and equality. Here is the solution. It is a matter of daily observation that the Frenchman's instinct is to strive after power; he cares not for liberty; equality is his idol. Now there is a hidden connection between equality and despotism. In both these respects Napoleon had a pull over the hearts of the French, who have a military liking for power and are democratically fond of seeing everything levelled. When he mounted the throne, he took the people with him. A proletarian king, he humiliated kings and noblemen in his anterooms. He levelled the ranks, not down but up. To have dragged them down to plebeian depths would have flattered the envy of the lowest; the higher level was more pleasing to their pride. French vanity, too, enjoyed the superiority which Bonaparte gave us over the rest of Europe. Another cause of Napoleon's popularity is the affliction of his latter days. After his death, as his sufferings on St. Helena became better known, people's hearts began to soften; his tyranny was forgotten; it was remembered how, having vanquished our enemies and subsequently having brought them into France, he defended our soil against them; we fancy that if he were alive today he would save us from the ignominy in which we are living. His misfortunes have revived his name among us, his glory has fed on his wretchedness. The miracles wrought by his arms have bewitched our youth, and have taught us to worship brute force. The most insolent ambition is spurred on by his unique career to aspire to the heights which he attained."

"In France Napoleon tamed the revolution and put it into the imperial straitjacket (and, in so doing, perhaps did more than the revolution itself to make a Bourbon restoration permanently impossible); beyond the borders of France he was the missionary and disseminator of the ideas of the revolution. Hence, as the Napoleonic legend grew through the succeeding century, the literary champions of Napoleon in France tended to be men of the Right, whereas outside France it was generally the Left which made him its idol-a perfectly natural phenomenon which Mr. Taylor needlessly attributes to the perversity of the English Left. This ambiguous role is the common destiny of heirs of revolutions, whose business it is to consolidate and stabilize the achievements of the revolution at home and capitalize them abroad."

"That contempt of humanity, that misprision of the opinion of others, that Caesarean pride, that insensitive heart and that profound moral indifference, these characteristics which distinguished Napoleon were not those of a Frenchman."

"Bonaparte busied himself with extinguishing what yet remained of the freedom of expression won during the Revolution and with crushing what yet remained of organized opposition, whether royalist, Jacobin or merely intellectual. On 17 January 1800 he shut down sixty out of seventy-three existing newspapers; by the end of 1800 only nine remained, and those under strict censorship. The theatre was censored from April 1800. With his excessive sensitivity to personal criticism and ridicule, Bonaparte took a direct interest in this censorship... In July 1803 he ordered that bookshops be prohibited from placing new works on sale until seven days after a copy had been submitted to the censor "so that, as soon as there is an undesirable work, it can be stopped." The systematic opening of private correspondence, the ubiquitous police spy, and imprisonment without trial completed Bonaparte's practical interpretation of the "sacred right" of liberty guaranteed by the Constitution."

"His views on politics and society, owing much to Rousseau's Du Contrat Social, display Buonaparte the egotist and Buonaparte the mathematician-engineer in uneasy collaboration. For society is conceived as of one great machine, constructed according to correct calculations which in turn are based on the right data. There is little sense of free association between individuals or groups, little sense of any natural community larger than the Corsican-style family or clan; no sense of organic social growth. Instead there are the competing egotisms of individuals, bridled or organized by the higher egotism of the State, whose will impels and directs the whole national apparatus. Buonaparte's ideal State enjoyed this untrammelled power because it was the organ of the people's will. Naïvely he believed that only hereditary monarchies could be tyrants. He scorned the ancien régime in France, with its agglomeration of different societies, partly regional, partly aristocratic, guild or religious; this is what constitutes the "privilege" which he and other progressives wished to sweep away. Buonaparte's chief complaint against the Catholic Church, for instance, lay in the very fact that it was independent of the State... Buonaparte's political ideas thus point straight towards the tyranny of the Consulate and the Empire; indeed towards every modern tyranny where the State bosses the entire life of the people in the people's name."

"England is a Nation of Shopkeepers."

"Every soldier carries a Marshal's baton in his knapsack"

"Religious wars are basically people killing each other over who has the better imaginary friend."

"Never ascribe to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity."

"A constitution should be short and obscure."

"Give them a whiff of grapeshot."

"An army of sheep, led by a lion, is better than an army of lions, led by a sheep."

"Able was I ere I saw Elba."

"Geography is destiny."

"‘Do you know,’ Napoleon once said to Fontanes, ‘what fills me most with wonder? The powerlessness of force to establish anything. There are only two powers in the world: the sword and the mind. In the end, the sword is always conquered by the mind.’"

"Well then, I will tell you. Alexander, Caesar, Charlemagne and I myself have founded great empires; but upon what did these creations of our genius depend? Upon force. Jesus alone founded His empire upon love, and to this very day millions will die for Him. I think I understand something of human nature; and I tell you, all these were men, and I am a man: none else is like Him; Jesus Christ was more than a man. I have inspired multitudes with such an enthusiastic devotion that they would have died for me but to do this it was necessary that I should be visibly present with the electric influence of my looks, my words, of my voice. When I saw men and spoke to them, I lighted up the flame of self-devotion in their hearts. Christ alone has succeeded in so raising the mind of man toward the unseen, that it becomes insensible to the barriers of time and space. Across a chasm of eighteen hundred years, Jesus Christ makes a demand which is beyond all others difficult to satisfy; He asks for that which a philosopher may often seek in vain at the hands of his friends, or a father of his children, or a bride of her spouse, or a man of his brother. He asks for the human heart; He will have it entirely to Himself. He demands it unconditionally; and forthwith His demand is granted. Wonderful! In defiance of time and space, the soul of man, with all its powers and faculties, becomes an annexation to the empire of Christ. All who sincerely believe in Him, experience that remarkable, supernatural love toward Him. This phenomenon is unaccountable; it is altogether beyond the scope of man's creative powers. Time, the great destroyer, is powerless to extinguish this sacred flame; time can neither exhaust its strength nor put a limit to its range. This is it, which strikes me most; I have often thought of it. This it is which proves to me quite convincingly the Divinity of Jesus Christ."

"There is no subordination with empty stomachs."

"Tristan is very idle. He confessed to the Emperor that he did not work every day. "Do you not eat every day?" said the Emperor to him; "Yes, Sire." "Well, then, you ought to work every day; no one should eat who does not work." "Oh! if that be the case, I will work every day," said the child, quickly. "Such is the influence of the belly," said the Emperor, tapping that of little Tristan. "It is hunger that makes the world move.""

"Leave the Artillerymen alone, they are an obstinate lot."

"The future destiny of the child is always the work of his mother. Let France have good mothers, and she will have good sons."

"You call these baubles, well, it is with baubles that men are led... Do you think that you would be able to make men fight by reasoning? Never. That is only good for the scholar in his study. The soldier needs glory, distinctions, and rewards."

"If I had succeeded, I would have been the greatest man known to history."

"I am the instrument of providence, she will use me as long as I accomplish her designs, then she will break me like a glass."

"Never interrupt your enemy when he is making a mistake."