Catherine the Great Quotes
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One cannot always know what children are thinking. Children are hard to understand, especially when careful training has a custom them to obedience and experience has made them cautious in conversation with their teachers.
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I like to praise and reward in a loud voice and to scold in a whisper.
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In politics a capable ruler must be guided by circumstances, conjectures and conjunctions.
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You can be a murderous tyrant and the world will remember you fondly but fuck one horse and you will be a horse fucker for all eternity.
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The more a man knows, the more he forgives.
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I may be kindly, I am ordinarily gentle, but in my line of business I am obliged to will terribly what I will at all.
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The use of torture is contrary to sound judgment and common sense. Humanity itself cries out against it, and demands it to be utterly abolished.
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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.
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You philosophers are lucky men. You write on paper and paper is patient. Unfortunate Empress that I am, I write on the susceptible skins of living beings.
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I do not love strife, because I have always found that in the end each remains of the same opinion.
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Nothing is more difficult, in my opinion, than to avoid something that fundamentally attracts you.
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Madame, 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.
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All punishments by which the human body might be maimed are barbarbarism.
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I shall be an autocrat: that's my trade. And the good Lord will forgive me: that's his.
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Bad news travels faster than good.
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I have no way to defend my borders but to extend them.
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Men make love more intensely at 20, but make love better, however, at 30.
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Power without a nation's confidence is nothing.
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I praise loudly. I blame softly.
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For to tempt and to be tempted are things very nearly allied - whenever feeling has anything to do in the matter, no sooner is it excited than we have already gone vastly farther than we are aware of.
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All this is only for the mice and myself to admire!
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I sincerely want peace, not because I lack resources for war, but because I hate bloodshed.
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If I may venture to be frank I would say about myself that I was every inch a gentleman ...
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Don't worry about things you cannot alter