Catherine the Great Quotes
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Don't worry about things you cannot alter
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One does not always do the best there is. One does the best one can.
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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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You were in a mood to quarrel. Please inform me once the inclination passes.
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I cannot live one day without love.
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God, grant us our desires, and grant them quickly.
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A great wind is blowing, and that gives you either imagination or a headache.
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I am one of the people who love the why of things.
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I beg you take courage; the brave soul can mend even disaster.
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What right can give anyone authority to inflict torture upon a citizen when it is still unknown whether he is innocent or guilty?
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Happiness and unhappiness are in the heart and spirit of each one of us: If you feel unhappy, then place yourself above that and act so that your happiness does not get to be dependent on anything.
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If Russians knew how to read they would write me off.
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It is better to inspire a reform than to enforce it.
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I will live to make myself not feared.
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The title of Queen rang sweet to my ears, child though I was. ... This idea of a crown began running in my head then like a tune, and has been running a lot in it ever since.
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Self-interest usually brings injustice with it.
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Tell a thousand people to draft a letter, let them debate every phrase, and see how long it takes and what you get.
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[On Peter III:] He did not have a bad heart; but a weak man usually has not.
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Very early it was noticed that I had a good memory; therefore I was insistently tormented with learning everything by heart.
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Your wit makes others witty.
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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.
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In my position you have to read when you want to write and to talk when you would like to read.
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The laws ought to be so framed as to secure the safety of every citizen as much as possible. ... Political liberty does not consist in the notion that a man may do whatever he pleases; liberty is the right to do whatsoever the laws allow. ... The equality of the citizens consists in that they should all be subject to the same laws.
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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.