Top 500 Napoleon Quotes (2025 Update)
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251. “Soldiers generally win battles; generals get credit for them.”

— Napoleon

252. “History is the version of past events that people have decided to agree upon.”

— Napoleon

253. “God is on the side of the heaviest cannon.”

— Napoleon

254. “If I were an Englishman, I should esteem the man who advised a war with China to be the greatest living enemy of my country. You would be beaten in the end, and perhaps a revolution in India would follow.”

— Napoleon

255. “I can no longer obey; I have tasted command, and I cannot give it up.”

— Napoleon

256. “The logical end to defensive warfare is surrender.”

— Napoleon

257. “The most terrible of all my battles was the one before Moscow. The French showed themselves to be worthy of victory, but the Russians showed themselves worthy of being invincible.”

— Napoleon

258. “Why and how are words so important that they cannot be too often used.”

— Napoleon

259. “In war, three-quarters turns on personal character and relations; the balance of manpower and materials counts only for the remaining quarter.”

— Napoleon

260. “We are born, we live, we die among supernatural.”

— Napoleon

261. “An army of lions commanded by a deer will never be an army of lions.”

— Napoleon

262. “Power is my mistress. I have worked too hard at her conquest to allow anyone to take her away from me.”

— Napoleon

263. “Independence, like honor, is a rocky island, without a beach.”

— Napoleon

264. “I have destroyed the enemy merely by marches.”

— Napoleon

265. “If I were to give liberty to the press, my power could not last three days.”

— Napoleon

266. “Doctors will have more lives to answer for in the next world than even we generals.”

— Napoleon

267. “I would believe any religion that could prove it had existed since the beginning of the world. But when I see Socrates, Plato, Moses, and Mohammed I do not think there is such a one. All religions owe their origin to man.”

— Napoleon

268. “The heart of a statesman should be in his head.”

— Napoleon

269. “Here, Gentlemen, a dog teaches us a lesson in humanity.”

— Napoleon

270. “All the women in the world would not make me lose an hour.”

— Napoleon

271. “Wine is inspiring and adds greatly to the joy of living.”

— Napoleon

272. “I shall be an Attila to Venice.”

— Napoleon

273. “France has more need of me than I have need of France.”

— Napoleon

274. “War justifies everything.”

— Napoleon

275. “Lies circle the earth while Truth is still trying to put on its shoes.”

— Napoleon

276. “Power is what they like – it is the greatest of all aphrodisiacs.”

— Napoleon

277. “Nothing is so important in war as an undivided command.”

— Napoleon

278. “Throw off your worries when you throw off your clothes at night.”

— Napoleon

279. “I am the successor, not of Louis XVI, but of Charlemagne.”

— Napoleon

280. “Peoples of Egypt, you will be told that I have come to destroy your religion. Do not believe it! Reply that I have come to restore your rights!”

— Napoleon

281. “I love a brave soldier who has undergone the baptism of fire.”

— Napoleon

282. “What a beautiful fix we are in now; peace has been declared.”

— Napoleon

283. “Among those who dislike oppression are many who like to oppress.”

— Napoleon

284. “A King should sacrifice the best affections of his heart for the good of his country; no sacrifice should be above his determination.”

— Napoleon

285. “He who is unmoved by tears has no heart.”

— Napoleon

286. “I engage and after that I see what to do.”

— Napoleon

287. “How many things apparently impossible have nevertheless been performed by resolute men who had no alternative but death.”

— Napoleon

288. “Collective crimes incriminate no one.”

— Napoleon

289. “I wish I could take a raincheck on June 18.1815.”

— Napoleon

290. “Lack is more in means, than in principles.”

— Napoleon

291. “Remember that a man, a true man, never hates. His rages and his bad moods never last beyond the present moment-like electric shocks.”

— Napoleon

292. “It is exceptional and difficult to find in one man all the qualities necessary for a great general.”

— Napoleon

293. “Hereditary succession to the magistracy is absurd, as it tends to make a property of it; it is incompatible with the sovereignty of the people.”

— Napoleon

294. “All Italians are plunderers.”

— Napoleon

295. “Un croquis vaut mieux qu.”

— Napoleon

296. “In war the simplest manoeuvres are the best.”

— Napoleon

297. “The superior man is never in anyone’s way.”

— Napoleon

298. “Bloodletting is among the ingredients of political medicine.”

— Napoleon

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

— Napoleon

300. “People take England on trust, and repeat that Shakespeare is the greatest of all authors. I have read him: there is nothing that compares Racine or Corneille: his plays are unreadable, pitiful.”

— Napoleon