What, to the American slave, is your Fourth of July? I answer: a day that reveals to him, more than all other days in the year, the gross injustice and cruelty to which he is the constant victim. To him your celebration is a sham.

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 tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is its natural manure.

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

The Revolution is made by man, but man must forge his revolutionary spirit from day to day.

Politics is the art of the possible.

I’m president of the United States, and I’m not going to eat any more broccoli!

Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

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

The affairs of the world are no more than so much trickery, and a man who toils for money or honor or whatever else in deference to the wishes of others, rather than because his own desire or needs lead him to do so, will always be a fool.

A real leader is somebody who can help us overcome the limitations of our own individual laziness and selfishness and weakness and fear and get us to do better, harder things than we can get ourselves to do on our own.

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

Do that which consists in taking no action, and order will prevail.