Quote collection
48 quotes — follow a thought to its full quote page.
"you must be gay; only thus can life be endured. I speak from experience for I have had to endure much, and have only been able to endure it because I have always laughed whenever I had the chance."
"Any man who doesn't partake in cigar smoking is nothing more than a weak-willed, meandering oaf, and I would never put my lips to those of any creature, man or beast, whose lips were not fresh awash in the currents of cigar smoke.'"
"Experience shows that the frequent use of severe punishment has never rendered a people better. The death of a criminal is a less effective means of restraining crimes than the permanent example of a man deprived of his liberty during the whole of his life to make amends for the injury he has done to the public."
"I cannot live one day without love."
"If I may venture to be frank I would say about myself that I was every inch a gentleman."
"God, grant us our desires, and grant them quickly."
"I will live to make myself not feared."
"[On Peter III:] He did not have a bad heart; but a weak man usually has not."
"bad news travels faster than good."
"Tell a thousand people to draft a letter, let them debate every phrase, and see how long it takes and what you get."
"You should know our mania for building is stronger than ever. It is a diabolical thing. It consumes money and the more you build, the more you want to build. It's a sickness like being addicted to alcohol."
"to tempt and be tempted are closely allied; and in spite of all the finest moral maxims buried in the mind, when emotion interferes, when feeling makes its appearance, one is already much further involved that one realizes, and I have still not learnt how to prevent its appearance."
"The trouble is that my heart is loath to be without love even for a single hour. ... If you want to keep me forever, then show as much friendship as love, and more than anything else, love me and tell me the truth."
"Your wits make others witty."
"self-interest usually brings injustice with it."
"All punishments by which the human body might be maimed are barbarbarism."
"If Russians knew how to read, they would write me off."
"The most sure, but at the same time the most difficult expedient to mend the morals of the people, is a perfect system of education."
"Praise is the only gift for which people are really grateful. Marguerite, Countess of Blessington I praise loudly; I blame softly."
"Assuredly men of merit are never lacking at any time, for those are the men who manage affairs, and it is affairs that produce the men. I have never searched, and I have always found under my hand the men who have served me, and for the most part I have been well served."