“What is a throne? — a bit of wood gilded and covered in velvet. I am the state— I alone am here the representative of the people. Even if I had done wrong you should not have reproached me in public—people wash their dirty linen at home. France has more need of me than I of France.”

“A throne is only a bench covered with velvet.”

“Let France have good mothers, and she will have good sons.”

“Show me a family of readers, and I will show you the people who move the world.”

“This soldier, I realized, must have had friends at home and in his regiment; yet he lay there deserted by all except his dog. I looked on, unmoved, at battles which decided the future of nations. Tearless, I had given orders which brought death to thousands. Yet here I was stirred, profoundly stirred, stirred to tears. And by what? By the grief of one dog.'Napoleon Bonaparte, on finding a dog beside the body of his dead master, licking his face and howling, on a moonlit field after a battle. Napoleon was haunted by this scene until his own death.”

“A cowardly act! What do I care about that? You may be sure that I should never fear to commit one if it were to my advantage.”

“I have seen only yoU, I have admired only yoU, I desire only You”