Those who give the first shock to a state are the first overwhelmed in its ruin; the fruits of public commotion are seldom enjoyed by him who was the first mover; he only beats the water for another’s net.

The spirit of revolution, the spirit of insurrection, is a spirit radically opposed to liberty.

Revolutionaries are greater sticklers for formality than conservatives.

The brutalities of progress are called revolutions. When they are over we realize this: that the human has been roughly handled, but that it has advanced.

All men recognize the right of revolution, that is, the right to refuse allegiance to, and to resist, the government, when its tyranny or its inefficiency are great and unendurable.

The most radical revolutionary will become a conservative on the day after the revolution.

The children of the revolution are always ungrateful, and the revolution must be grateful that it is so.

It is better to die on your feet than to live on your knees.

There is a kind of revolution of so general a character that it changes the mental tastes as well as the fortunes of the world.

All revolutions devour their own children.

The peasants alone are revolutionary, for they have nothing to lose and everything to gain. The starving peasant, outside the class system, is the first among the exploited to discover that only violence pays. For him there is no compromise, no possible coming to terms. 

I have been ever of the opinion that revolutions are not to be evaded.

Rebellion to tyrants is obedience to God.