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Six hours' sleep for a man, seven for a woman, and eight for a fool.
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I cannot believe there is a god who punishes and rewards, for I see honest folk unlucky, and rogues unlucky.
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Nothing makes the future look so rosy as to contemplate it through a glass of Chambertin.
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Better to have an open enemy, than hidden friends.
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No one but myself can be blamed for my fall. I have been my own greatest enemy-the cause of my own disastrous fate.
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The greatest general is he who makes the fewest mistakes.
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Let France have good mothers, and she will have good sons.
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In a battle, as in a siege, the art consists in concentrating very heavy fire on a particular point. The line of battle once established, the one who has the ability to concentrate an unlooked for mass of artillery suddenly and unexpectedly on one of these points is sure to carry the day.
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You would make a ship sail against the winds and currents by lighting a bonfire under her decks? I have no time for such nonsense.
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True heroism consists in rising superior to misfortune.
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Morality for the upper classes, the gallows for the rabbles.
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Courage isn't having the strength to go on - it is going on when you don't have strength.
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My mind is a chest of drawers. When I wish to deal with a subject, I shut all the drawers but the one in which the subject is to be found. When I am wearied, I shut all the drawers and go to sleep.
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What my enemies call a general peace is my destruction. What I call peace is merely the disarmament of my enemies. Am I not more moderate than they?
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We live and die in the midst of marvels.
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A woman laughing is a woman conquered.
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You think you are too intelligent to believe in God. I am not like you.
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Better to have a known enemy than a forced ally.
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France always has plenty men of talent, but it is always deficient in men of action and high character.
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The reason I beat the Austrians is, they did not known the value of five minutes.
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Called to the throne by the voice of the people, my maxim has always been: A career open to talent without distinction of birth. It is this system of equality for which the European oligarchy detests me.
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Tis a principle of war that when you can use the lightning, 'tis better than cannon.
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Men are led by trifles.
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In war, groping tactics, half-way measures, lose everything.