Otto Von Bismarck Quotes

Man cannot control the current of events. he can only float with them and steer

I have often regretted what I have eaten, but never what I have drunk.

Fools learn from experience. I prefer to learn from the experience of others.

I have only one ambition left: I should like to have a good epitaph.

The death of Lincoln was a disaster for Christendom. There was no man in the United States great enough to wear his boots and the bankers went anew to grab the riches. I fear that foreign bankers with their craftiness and tortuous tricks will entirely control the exuberant riches of America and use it to systematically corrupt civilization.

Laws are like medicine; they generally cure an evil by a lesser or a passing evil.

The Catholic priest, from the moment he becomes a priest, is a sworn officer of the pope.

Politics ruins the character

Your map of Africa is really quite nice. But my map of Africa lies in Europe. Here is Russia, and here ... is France, and we're in the middle - that's my map of Africa.

I have wished to crush Rome that I might crush Christianity.

When you want to fool the world, tell the truth.

There are two things you don't want to see being made - sausage and legislation.

[Government]is cancerous in head and limbs;only its belly is sound, and the laws it excretes are the most strightforward shit in the world.

All treaties between great states cease to be binding when they come in conflict with the struggle for existence.

Political judgment is the ability to hear the distant hoofbeats of the horse of history.

He who has his thumb on the purse has the power.

Preventive war is like committing suicide out of fear of death.

God always looks after the fools and - and the United States.

The luxury of one's own opinion.

Only a fool learns from his own mistakes. The wise man learns from the mistakes of others.

Fools you are. To say you learn by your experience. I prefer to profit by others' mistakes and avoid the price of my own.

There is only one greater folly than that of the fool who says in his heart there is no God, and that is the folly of the people that says with its head that it does not know whether there is a God or not.

A Bavarian is half-way between an Austrian and a human being.

An appeal to fear never finds an echo in German hearts.

Great men have great dogs.

The main thing is to make history not to write it

Politics are not a science based on logic; they are the capacity of always choosing at each instant, in constantly changing situations, the least harmful, the most useful.

I have seen three emperors in their nakedness, and the sight was not inspiring.

Let them stew in their own grease (or juice).

Do not expect that once taking advantage of Russia's weakness, you will receive dividends forever. Russian has always come for their money. And when they come - do not rely on an agreement signed by you, you are supposed to justify. They are not worth the paper it is written. Therefore, with the Russian is to play fair, or do not play.

In order to retain a certain respect for sausages and laws, one must not see them being made.

Politics is not a science, as the professors are apt to suppose. It is an art.

It is the destiny of the weak to be devoured by the strong.

You can do everything with bayonets, but you are not able to sit on them

The secret of politics? Make a good treaty with Russia.

You can't destroy the polish national-consciousness or Poles on the battlefield, but if you give them power, they will destroy themselves

If there is ever another war in Europe, it will come out of some damned silly thing in the Balkans.

The division of the United States into federations of equal force was decided long before the Civil War by the high financial powers of Europe. These bankers were afraid that the United States, if they remained in one block and as one nation, would attain economic and financial independence, which would upset their financial domination over the world. The voice of the Rothschilds prevailed ... Therefore they sent their emissaries into the field to exploit the question of slavery and to open an abyss between the two sections of the Union.

Politics is the art of the next best.

Fools you are who say you like to learn from your mistakes. I prefer to learn from the mistakes of others, and avoid the cost of my own.

A government must not waiver once it has chosen it's course. It must not look to the left or right but go forward.

Laws are like sausages. You sleep far better the less you know about how they are made.

With bad laws and good civil servants it's still possible to govern. But with bad civil servants even the best laws can't help.

You can do anything with children if you only play with them.

The Balkans aren't worth the life of a single Pomeranian grenadier.

We Germans fear God, but nothing else in the world; and it is the fear of God, which lets us love and foster peace.

The great questions of the day will not be settled by means of speeches and majority decisions but by iron and blood

I consider even a victorious war as an evil, from which statesmanship must endeavor to spare nations.

When you say you agree to a thing in principle you mean that you have not the slightest intention of carrying it out in practice.

A bad plan that is well executed will yield much better results than a good plan that is poorly executed.

There is a Providence that protects idiots, drunkards, children and the United States of America.

I must protest that I would never seek foreign conflicts just to go over domestic difficulties; that would be frivolous. I was speaking of conflicts that we could not avoid, even though we do not seek them.

Faust complained about having two souls in his breast, but I harbor a whole crowd of them and they quarrel. It is like being in a republic.

They treat me like a fox, a cunning fellow ( Schlaukopf ) of the first rank. But the truth is that with a gentleman I am always a gentleman and a half, and when I have to do with a pirate, I try to be a pirate and a half.

Not even the King himself has the right to subordinate the interests of his country to his own feelings of love or hatred towards strangers; he is, however, responsible towards God and not to me if he does so, and therefore on this point I am silent.

If you like laws and sausages, you should never watch either one being made.

Love is blind; friendship tries not to notice.

Even the most favorable outcome of the war will never lead to the decomposition of the main forces of Russia, which is based on millions of Russian ... The latter, even if they break up international treaties, just as quickly re-connect with each other, like pieces of a particle of mercury ...

Never fight with Russian. On your every stratagem they answer unpredictable stupidity.

Better pointed bullets than pointed words.

A journalist is a person who has mistaken their calling.

Lord takes care of babes, fools, and the United States.

Fools say that they learn by experience. I prefer to profit by others experience.

He obtained from Congress the right to borrow from the people by selling to it the 'bonds' of States ... and the Government and the nation escaped the plots of the foreign financiers. They understood at once, that the United States would escape their grip. The death of Lincoln was resolved upon.

I am bored. The great things are done. The German Reich is made.

A statesman ... must wait until he hears the steps of God sounding through events, then leap up and grasp the hem of His garment.

I do not regard the procuring of peace as a matter in which we should play the role of arbiter between different opinions ... more that of an honest broker who really wants to press the business forward.

People never lie so much as before an election, during a war, or after a hunt.

Vanity is a mortgage that must be deducted from the value of a man.

Life has taught me to forgive much, but to seek forgiveness still more.

Crowned heads, wealth and privilege may well tremble should ever again the Black and Red unite!
-after the split between Anarchists and Marxists in 1872

The statesman's task is to hear God's footsteps marching through history, and to try and catch on to His coattails as He marches past.

Politics is the art of the possible, the attainable - the art of the next best

In England the more horses a nobleman has, the more popular he is. So long as the English are devoted to racing, Socialism has no chance with you.

Revolutions in Prussia are started by kings, and since it is a revolution, it is better to start it ourselves than to suffer of it

No civilization other than that which is Christian, is worth seeking or possessing.

Earthly majesty is always akin to the fallen angel, who is proud and unhappy, beautiful but troubled, and whose plans and efforts, though vast, are denied access.

With a gentleman I am always a gentleman and a half, and with a fraud I try to be a fraud and a half.

A generation that has taken a beating is always followed by a generation that deals one.

I have never lived on principles. When I have had to act, I never first asked myself on what principles I was going to act, but I went at it and did what I thought fit. I have often reproached myself for my want of principle.