I shall be an autocrat: that’s my trade. And the good Lord will forgive me: that’s his.

All the ills of democracy can be cured by more democracy.

Treaties, you see, are like girls and roses: they last while they last.

There is no method by which men can be both free and equal.

I am no courtesan, nor moderator, nor tribune, nor defender of the people: I am myself the people.

No free man shall be taken or imprisoned or dispossessed or outlawed or exiled, or in any way destroyed, nor will we go upon him, nor will we send against him except by the lawful judgment of his peers or by the law of the land.

It is impossible to tell which of the two dispositions we find in men is more harmful in a republic, that which seeks to maintain an established position or that which has none but seeks to acquire it.

To be turned from one’s course by men’s opinions, by blame, and by misrepresentation shows a man unfit to hold office.

Envy is the basis of democracy.

My people and I have come to an agreement that satisfies us both. They are to say what they please, and I am to do what I please.

You campaign in poetry. You govern in prose.

No human life, not even the life of a hermit, is possible without a world which directly or indirectly testifies to the presence of other human beings.

The most hateful torment for men is to have knowledge of everything but power over nothing.