O citizens, first acquire wealth; you can practice virtue afterward.

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.

You have all the characteristics of a popular politician: a horrible voice, bad breeding, and a vulgar manner.

What experience and history teach is this—that nations and governments have never learned anything from history or acted upon any lessons they might have drawn from it.

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

Democracy is the recurrent suspicion that more than half of the people are right more than half of the time.

Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

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

You should never have your best trousers on when you go out to fight for freedom and truth.

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

Every communist must grasp the truth: “Political power grows out of the barrel of a gun.”

The first requirement of a statesman is that he be dull.

I work for a government I despise for ends I think criminal.