Napoleon Bonaparte
Napoleon I (born Napoleone di Buonaparte, later Napoléon Bonaparte) was a French military and political leader who had significant impact on modern European history. He was a general during the French Revolution, the ruler of France as Premier Consul of the French Republic, Empereur des Français, King of Italy, Mediator of the Swiss Confederation and Protector of the Confederation of the Rhine.
Born in Corsica and trained in mainland France as an artillery officer, he first rose to prominence as a general of the French Revolution, leading several successful campaigns against the First Coalition and the Second Coalition arrayed against France. In late 1799, Napoleon staged a coup d'état and installed himself as First Consul; five years later he became the Emperor of the French. In the first decade of the nineteenth century, he turned the armies of France against almost every major European power, dominating continental Europe through a lengthy streak of military victories—epitomized through battles such as Austerlitz and Friedland—and through the formation of extensive alliance systems. He appointed close friends and several members of his family as monarchs and important government figures of French-dominated states.
The disastrous French invasion of Russia in 1812 marked a turning point in Napoleon's fortunes. The campaign wrecked the Grande Armée, which never regained its previous strength. In October 1813, the Sixth Coalition defeated his forces at Leipzig and then invaded France. The coalition forced Napoleon to abdicate in April 1814, exiling him to the island of Elba. Less than a year later, he returned to France and regained control of the government in the Hundred Days (les Cent Jours) prior to his final defeat at Waterloo on 18 June 1815. Napoleon spent the remaining six years of his life under British supervision on the island of St. Helena. Napoleon developed relatively few military innovations, although his placement of artillery into batteries and the elevation of the army corps as the standard all-arms unit have become accepted doctrines in virtually all large modern armies. He drew his best tactics from a variety of sources and scored several major victories with a modernized and reformed French army. His campaigns are studied at military academies all over the world and he is widely regarded as one of history's greatest commanders. Aside from his military achievements, Napoleon is also remembered for the establishment of the Napoleonic Code (Code Napoléon), which laid the bureaucratic foundations for the modern French state.
“To understand the man you have to know what was happening in the world when he was twenty.”
“„Es gibt kein gutmütigeres, aber auch kein leichtgläubigeres Volk als das deutsche. Keine Lüge kann grob genug ersonnen werden, die Deutschen glauben sie. Um eine Parole, die man ihnen gab, verfolgen sie ihre Landsleute mit größerer Erbitterung als ihre wirklichen Feinde.”
“Quel roman pourtant que ma vie!”
“The battlefield is a scene of constant chaos. The winner will be the one who controls that chaos, both his own and the enemies”
“Power is my mistress. I have worked too hard at her conquest to allow anyone to take her away from me.”
“I hope before long to press you in my arms and shall shower on you a million burning kisses as under the Equator.”
“Impossible is the word found only in a fool's dictionary. Wise people create opportunities for themselves and make everything possible...”
“Nothing is lost as long as courage remains”
“Le mot impossible n'est pas français.”
“Give me enough medals and I’ll win you any war”
“The reason most people fail instead of succeed is they trade what they want most for what they want at the moment.”
“Exista lucruri care nu se scriu niciodata!”
“A commander-in-chief cannot take as an excuse for his mistakes in warfare an order given by his sovereign or his minister, when the person giving the order is absent from the field of operations and is imperfectly aware or wholly unaware of the latest state of affairs. It follows that any commander-in-chief who undertakes to carry out a plan which he considers defective is at fault; he must put forward his reasons, insist on the plan being changed, and finally tender his resignation rather than be the instrument of his army's downfall.”
“Es gibt keine andere Unsterblichkeit als die Erinnerung, die man im Geiste der Menschen zurücklässt.”
“If they want peace, nations should avoid the pin-pricks that precede cannon shots.”
“What are the conditions that make for the superiority of an army? Its internal organization, military habits in officers and men, the confidence of each in themselves; that is to say, bravery, patience, and all that is contained in the idea of moral means.”
“It is not that addresses at the opening of a battle make the soldiers brave. The old veterans scarcely hear them, and recruits forget them at the first boom of the cannon. Their usefulness lies in their effect on the course of the campaign, in neutralizing rumors and false reports, in maintaining a good spirit in the camp, and in furnishing matter for camp-fire talk. The printed order of the day should fulfill these different ends.”
“War is becoming an anachronism; if we have battled in every part of the continent it was because two opposing social orders were facing each other, the one which dates from 1789, and the old regime. They could not exist together; the younger devoured the other. I know very well, that, in the final reckoning, it was war that overthrew me, me the representative of the French Revolution, and the instrument of its principles. But no matter! The battle was lost for civilization, and civilization will inevitably take its revenge. There are two systems, the past and the future. The present is only a painful transition. Which must triumph? The future, will it not? Yes indeed, the future! That is, intelligence, industry, and peace. The past was brute force, privilege, and ignorance. Each of our victories was a triumph for the ideas of the Revolution. Victories will be won, one of these days, without cannon, and without bayonets.”
“Courage cannot be counterfeited. It is one virtue that escapes hypocrisy.”
“He who cannot look over a battlefield with a dry eye, causes the death of many men uselessly.”
“In war, theory is all right so far as general principles are concerned; but in reducing general principles to practice there will always be danger. Theory and practice are the axis about which the sphere of accomplishment revolves.”
“There is a joy in danger.”
“At the beginning of a campaign it is important to consider whether or not to move forward; but when one has taken the offensive it is necessary to maintain it to the last extremity. However skilfully effected a retreat may be, it always lessens the morale of an army, since in losing the chances of success, they are remitted to the enemy. A retreat, moreover, costs much more in men and materials than the bloodiest engagements, with this difference, also, that in a battle the enemy loses practically as much as you do; while in a retreat you lose and he does not.”
“A commander in chief ought to say to himself several times a day: If the enemy should appear on my front, on my right, on my left, what would I do? And if the question finds him uncertain, he is not well placed, he is not as he should be, and he should remedy it.”
“A general must be a charlatan.”
“We frustrate many designs against us by pretending not to see them.”
“The laws of circumstance are abolished by new circumstances.”
“The most difficult art is not in the choice of men, but in giving to the men chosen the highest service of which they are capable.”
“We are made weak both by idleness and distrust of ourselves. Unfortunate, indeed, is he who suffers from both. If he is a mere individual he becomes nothing; if he is a king he is lost.”
“Lead the ideas of your time and they will accompany and support you; fall behind them and they drag you along with them; oppose them and they will overwhelm you.”
“It is only with prudence, sagacity, and much dexterity that great aims are accomplished, and all obstacles surmounted. Otherwise nothing is accomplished.”
“In politics nothing is immutable. Events carry within them an invincible power. The unwise destroy themselves in resistance. The skillful accept events, take strong hold of them and direct them.”
“One must learn to forgive and not to hold a hostile, bitter attitude of mind, which offends those about us and prevents us from enjoying ourselves; one must recognize human shortcomings and adjust himself to them rather than to be constantly finding fault with them.”
“True character stands the test of emergencies. Do not be mistaken, it is weakness from which the awakening is rude.”
“Ordinarily men exercise their memory much more than their judgment.”
“It is not true that men never change; they change for the worse, as well as for the better. It is not true they are ungrateful; more often the benefactor rates his favors higher than their worth; and often too he does not allow for circumstances. If few men have the moral force to resist impulses, most men do carry within themselves the germs of virtues as well as of vices, of heroism as well as of cowardice. Such is human nature — education and circumstances do the rest.”
“One is more certain to influence men, to produce more effect on them, by absurdities than by sensible ideas.”
“It is a mistake, too, to say that the face is the mirror of the soul. The truth is, men are very hard to know, and yet, not to be deceived, we must judge them by their present actions, but for the present only.”
“The great mass of society are far from being depraved; for if a large majority were criminal or inclined to break the laws, where would the force or power be to prevent or constrain them? And herein is the real blessing of civilization, because this happy result has its origin in her bosom, growing out of her very nature.”
“Men have their virtues and their vices, their heroisms and their perversities; men are neither wholly good nor wholly bad, but possess and practice all that there is of good and bad here below. Such is the general rule. Temperament, education, the accidents of life, are modifying factors. Outside of this, everything is ordered arrangement, everything is chance. Such has been my rule of expectation and it has usually brought me success.”
“It is only by prudence, wisdom, and dexterity, that great ends are attained and obstacles overcome. Without these qualities nothing succeeds.”
“Never depend on the multitude, full of instability and whims; always take precautions against it.”
“One must indeed be ignorant of the methods of genius to suppose that it allows itself to be cramped by forms. Forms are for mediocrity, and it is fortunate that mediocrity can act only according to routine. Ability takes its flight unhindered.”
“As a rule it is circumstances that make men.”
“Success is the most convincing talker in the world.”
“There are so many laws that no one is safe from hanging.”
“Audacity succeeds as often as it fails; in life it has an even chance.”
“A great reserve and severity of manners are necessary for the command of those who are older than ourselves.”
“Orders and decorations are necessary in order to dazzle the people.”
“What is the government? Nothing, unless supported by opinion.”