He may be a patriot for Austria, but the question is whether he is a patriot for me.

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

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

If you must take care that your opinions do not differ in the least from those of the person with whom you are talking, you might just as well be alone.

It is a certain sign of a wise government and proceeding, when it can hold men’s hearts by hopes, when it cannot by satisfaction.

The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.

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.

Out of the crooked timber of humanity no straight thing was ever made.

Whether for good or evil, it is sadly inevitable that all political leadership requires the artifices of theatrical illusion. In the politics of a democracy, the shortest distance between two points is often a crooked line.

Natural rights is simple nonsense: natural and imprescriptible rights, rhetorical nonsense—nonsense upon stilts.

Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

A government which robs Peter to pay Paul can always count on the support of Paul.

There is nothing more tyrannical than a strong popular feeling among a democratic people.