Frederick The Great Quotes

It is enough", this malicious man tells us, "to extinguish the line of the defeated prince." Can one read this without quivering in horror and indignation? ~ Frederick The Great

Every man must get to Heaven his own way. ~ Frederick The Great

I have no fault to find with those who teach geometry. That science is the only one which has not produced sects; it is founded on analysis and on synthesis and on the calculus; it does not occupy itself with the probable truth; moreover it has the same method in every country. ~ Frederick The Great

A king is the first servant and first magistrate of the state. ~ Frederick The Great

The greatest and noblest pleasure which men can have in this world is to discover new truths; and the next is to shake off old prejudices. ~ Frederick The Great

Frederick the Great was accustomed to say: "The older one gets the more convinced one becomes that his Majesty King Chance does three-quarters of the business of this miserable universe." Sorel ~ Niccolo Machiavelli

If the men were without passions, it would be forgivable to see Machiavel try to give some to them; he would be the new [[Prometheus]] bringing celestial fire to breathe life into robots. But no man is without passions. When they are moderated, they are the heart of the enterprise; but when the brake is stripped of them, they are its destruction. ~ Frederick The Great

Diplomacy without arms is like music without instruments. ~ Frederick The Great

Euler calculated the force of the wheels necessary to raise the water in a reservoir ... My mill was carried out geometrically and could not raise a drop of water fifty yards from the reservoir. Vanity of vanities! Vanity of geometry! ~ Frederick The Great

He who defends everything, defends nothing. ~ Frederick The Great

Do not neglect the principles of foresight and know that often, puffed up with success, armies have lost the fruit of their heroism through a feeling of false security. ~ Frederick The Great

If I wished to punish a province, I would have it governed by philosophers. ~ Frederick The Great

What is the good of experience if you do not reflect? ~ Frederick The Great

Diplomacy without armaments is like music without instruments. – Frederick the Great ~ George F. Will

The Miracle of the House of Brandenburg had come to pass. ~ Frederick The Great

By looking after his relatives' interests as he did, Napoleon furthermore displayed incredible weakness on the purely human level. When a man occupies such a position, he should eliminate all his family feeling. Napoleon, on the contrary, placed his brothers and sisters in posts of command, and retained them in these posts even after they'd given proofs of their incapability. All that was necessary was to throw out all these patently incompetent relatives. Instead of that, he wore himself out with sending his brothers and sisters, regularly every month, letters containing reprimands and warnings, urging them to do this and not to do that, thinking he could remedy their incompetence by promising them money, or by threatening not to give them any more. Such illogical behaviour can be explained only by the feeling Corsicans have for their families, a feeling in which they resemble the Scots. By thus giving expression to his family feeling, Napoleon introduced a disruptive principle into his life. Nepotism, in fact, is the most formidable protection imaginable : the protection of the ego. But wherever it has appeared in the life of a State - the monarchies are the best proof - it has resulted in weakening and decay. Reason : it puts an end to the principle of effort.
In this respect, Frederick the Great showed himself superior to Napoleon - Frederick who, at the most difficult moments of his life, and when he had to take the hardest decisions, never forgot that things are ca ~ Adolf Hitler

Pleasure is the most real good in this life. ~ Frederick The Great

Being goal directed is not enough to conquer your enemy. To achieve your goal you need to know and be able to utilize all the resources available to you. This includes the knowledge of all those available to you as well as using the physical resources and those who control them. ~ Frederick The Great

Nowadays it is seen as a shame, to marry a girl who is a mother, who has never been married. I want to get rid of that prejudice. ~ Frederick The Great

He who cannot stand misfortune does not deserve good fortune. ~ Frederick The Great

Our work is to present things that are as they are. ~ Frederick The Great

A crown is merely a hat that lets the rain in. ~ Frederick The Great

You will certainly grant me that neither antiquity nor whatever nation has devised a more repulsive and blasphemous absurdity than that of eating your God. This is the most disgusting dogma of Christian religion, the greatest insult to the Highest Being, the climax of madness and insanity. ~ Frederick The Great

A German singer! I should as soon expect to get pleasure from the neighing of my horse. ~ Frederick The Great

Christianity is the most ridiculous, the most absurd, and bloody religion that has ever infected the world.
[In a letter to Frederick the Great] ~ Voltaire

It does not pay a man to exist until the age of Methuselah by making his days indolent and useless. The more this is reflected upon, them ore the reflector will desire to undertake meaningful and useful actions, the more they will have lived. ~ Frederick The Great

Christianity is an old metaphysical fiction, stuffed with fables, contradictions and absurdities: it was spawned in the fevered imagination of the Orientals, and then spread to our Europe, where some fanatics espoused it, where some intriguers pretended to be convinced by it and where some imbeciles actually believed it. ~ Frederick The Great

Be more than you seem to be. ~ Frederick The Great

Little minds try to defend everything at once, but sensible people look at the main point only; they parry the worst blows and stand a little hurt if thereby they avoid a greater one. If you try to hold everything, you hold nothing. ~ Frederick The Great

Don't forget your great guns, which are the most respectable arguments of the rights of kings. ~ Frederick The Great

Artillery adds dignity, to what would otherwise be an ugly brawl. ~ Frederick The Great

It is certainly of great importance for a general to keep his plans secret; and Frederick the Great was right when he said that if his night-cap knew what was in his head he would throw it into the fire. That kind of secrecy was practicable in Frederick's time when his whole army was kept closely about him; but when maneuvers of the vastness of Napoleon's are executed, and war is waged as in our day, what concert of action can be expected from generals who are utterly ignorant of what is going on around them? ~ Antoine-Henri Jomini

Compare Holland with Russia; you see only marshy and sterile islands in the former, which rise from the center of the ocean: a small republic which is only 48 miles length by 40 wide. But this small body is the very nerve-center of the region: immense people live in it, and these industrious people are both powerful and rich. They shook the yoke of the Spanish domination, which was then the most formidable monarchy of Europe. The trade of this republic extends to the ends of the world; and new trade appears almost immediately; it can maintain in times of war an army fifty thousand men, without counting a many and well maintained fleet. ~ Frederick The Great

Theologians are all alike, of whatever religion or country they may be; their aim is always to wield despotic authority over men's consciences; they therefore persecute all of us who have the temerity to tell the truth. ~ Frederick The Great

He was in stature but a small man, yet remember that so were Napoleon, Lord Beaverbrook, Stephen A. Douglas, Frederick the Great, and the Dr. Goebbels who is privily known throughout Germany as Wotan's Mickey Mouse. ~ Sinclair Lewis

It has been said by a certain general, that the first object in the establishment of an army ought to be making provision for the belly, that being the basis and foundation of all operations ~ Frederick The Great

Young Alexander conquered India.
He alone?
Caesar beat the Gauls. Was there not even a cook in his army?
Philip of Spain wept as his fleet was sunk and destroyed. Were there no other tears?
Frederick the Great triumphed in the Seven Years War. Who
Triumphed with him? ~ Bertolt Brecht

But France's powerful armies, and a very large number of fortresses, ensure that the French Sovereign will possess the throne forever, and they do not have anything to fear now concerning internal wars or their neighbors invading France. ~ Frederick The Great

Consequently, the value and importance of the monarchic idea cannot reside in the person of the monarch himself except if Heaven decides to lay the crown on the brow of the heroic genius like Frederick the Great or a wise character like William I. ~ Adolf Hitler

I begin by taking. I shall find scholars later to demonstrate my perfect right. ~ Frederick The Great

It is the fashion these days to make war, and presumably it will last a while yet. ~ Frederick The Great

Though I may not be a king in my future life, so much the better: I shall nevertheless live an active life and, on top of it, earn less ingratitude. ~ Frederick The Great

There is a little phrase commonly used in police work that says, "in accordance with the evidence." You say that over six times a day as a grace before and after meals, and perhaps it will keep your feet on the ground and stop you ending up thinking you're Frederick the Great or a hedgehog or something. ~ Josephine Tey

In my state every man can be saved after his own fashion. ~ Frederick The Great

My people and I have come to an agreement which satisfied us both. They are to say what they please, and I am to do what I please. ~ Frederick The Great

No government can exist without taxation. The money must necessarily be levied on the people; and the grand art consists of levying so as not to oppress. ~ Frederick The Great

The people say what they like and then I do what I like ~ Frederick The Great

Great advantage is drawn from knowledge of your adversary, and when you know the measure of his intelligence and character, you can use it to play on his weakness. ~ Frederick The Great

Frederick the Great once said that the greatest crime in war is not to make the wrong decision, but to make no decision.' Again the Prince gestured at Sharpe with the brandy glass. 'You should remember that axiom, Sharpe!' Sharpe did not even know what an axiom was, but he nodded respectfully. 'I will, sir. ~ Bernard Cornwell

To your care and recommendation am I indebted for having replaced a half-blind mathematician with a mathematician with both eyes, which will especially please the anatomical members of my Academy. ~ Frederick The Great

Hitler's historical hero had always been Frederick the Great. [Later], under Goebbels' prompting ... Napoleon emerged ... as his model ... Frederick the Great was a man who knew when to stop [and] Napoleon did not. ~ Ernst Hanfstaengl

To this group belong not only the genuinely great statesmen but all the great reformers as well. Beside Frederick the Great we have men such as Martin Luther and Richard Wagner. ~ Adolf Hitler

It is disgusting to note the increase in the quantity of coffee used by my subjects and the amount of money that goes out of the country in consequence. Everybody is using coffee. If possible, this must be prevented. My people must drink beer. ~ Frederick The Great

People sought reforms, not rights. Had the throne then been occupied by a monarch of the calibre and character of Frederick the Great, I have no doubt he would have accomplished many of the reforms which were brought about by the Revolution; and that not only without endangering his throne, but with a large gain of power. ~ Alexis De Tocqueville

Christianity - An old metaphysical romance, filled with marvels, contradictions, and absurdity, born in the ardent imagination of Orientals, has spread into our Europe. Enthusiasts have purveyed it, careerists have pretended to accept it, imbeciles have believed it. ~ Frederick The Great

N]either antiquity nor any other nation has imagined a more atrocious and blasphemous absurdity than that of eating God. This is how Christians treat the autocrat of the universe. ~ Frederick The Great

It seems to me that man is made to act rather than to know: the principles of things escape our most persevering researches. ~ Frederick The Great

Religion is the idol of the mob; it adores everything it does not understand. ~ Frederick The Great

Always presume that the enemy has dangerous designs and always be forehanded with the remedy. But do not let these calculations make your timid. ~ Frederick The Great

In trying to defend everything he defended nothing. ~ Frederick The Great

As to your Newton, I confess I do not understand his void and his gravity; I admit he has demonstrated the movement of the heavenly bodies with more exactitude than his forerunners; but you will admit it is an absurdity to maintain the existence of Nothing.
[Letter to Voltaire, 25 Nov. 1777] ~ Frederick The Great

God is always with the strongest battalions. ~ Frederick The Great

After the battle the king can do what he likes with my head, but during the battle will he please allow me to use it? [During the battle of Zorndorf in 1758 goaded by interference of Frederick the Great of Prussia] ~ Friedrich Wilhelm Von Seydlitz

Every man has a wild beast within him. ~ Frederick The Great

To them belong, not only the truly great statesmen, but all other great reformers as well. Beside Frederick the Great stands Martin Luther as well as Richard Wagner. ~ Adolf Hitler

My people must drink beer. ~ Frederick The Great

(About Cesare Borgia) What cruelties were not the result of his? Who could count all his crimes? Such was the man that Machiavel prefers to all the great geniuses of his time, and to the heroes of antiquity, and of which he finds the life and action make a good example for those that fortune favors. ~ Frederick The Great

Bloody North," said Shev as she picked her way towards it and had a tentative drag at the ropes. "Even their bridges are shit."
"Their men are good," said Javre, clattering out with no fear whatsoever. "Far from subtle, but enthusiastic."
"Great," said Shev as she edged after, exchanging a mutually suspicious glance with a crow perched atop one of the posts. "Men. The one thing that interests me not at all."
"You should try them."
"I did. Once. Bloody useless. Like trying to have a conversation with someone who doesn't even speak your language, let alone understand the topic."
"Some are certainly more horizontally fluent than others."
"No. Just no. The hairiness, and the lumpiness, and the great big fumbling fingers and ... balls. I mean, balls. What's that about? That is one singularly unattractive piece of anatomy. That is just ... that is bad design, is what that is. ~ Joe Abercrombie

Metaphysics is the study of how to shift the self. How to get outside the self-reflection and to just gaze with awe and wonder at the countless universes, the countless celestial radiances of mind, of life, of enlightenment, nirvana, or God, whatever you want to call it. ~ Frederick Lenz

Knowledge was the great thing
not abstract knowledge in which Dr. Forester had been so rich, the theories which lead one enticingly on with their appearance of nobility, of transcendent virtue, but detailed, passionate, trivial human knowledge. ~ Graham Greene

Let's go see who can eat the most dumplings in the shortest amount of time. And duck! You really ought to try pressed duck! It's a great delicacy." Jem looked at Will, suppressing a smile. His friend glared back, but at last neither of them could hold back their laughter. Will said, "There is nothing so sweet as feasting upon the bones of my enemies. Especially with you at my side. ~ Cassandra Clare

We look at mountains and call them eternal, and they seem ... but in the course of time, mountains rise and fall, rivers change their courses, starts fall from the sky, and great cities sink beneath the sea. Even gods die, we think. Everything changes. ~ George R R Martin

I wanted to say two further things to you today: irony: Do not let yourself be governed by it, especially not in unproductive moments. In productive ones try to make use of it as one more means of seizing life. Used purely, it is itself pure, and one need not be ashamed of it; and when you feel too familiar with it, when you fear the growing intimacy with it, then turn towards great and serious subjects, before which it becomes small and helpless. Seek for the depth of things: there irony never descends - and when you have thus brought it to the edge of greatness, test at the same time whether this mode of perception springs from a necessity of your being. ~ Rainer Maria Rilke

As far as my opinion on galleries, I think they are a great thing .I see them as another outlet. I'm sure by now you've figured out that I do my work for everybody to see. That's the whole point. ~ KAWS

I looked around the garden, the sun feeling warm on my back. "So why are you here? I would think you'd want to be as far away from a hurricane as possible."
She looked at me as if I'd just suggested streaking down the beach. It took her a moment to answer. "Because this is home." She wanted to see if the words registered with me, but I just looked back at her, not understanding at all.
After a deep breath, she looked up at a tall oak tree beyond the garden, its leaves still green against the early October sky, the limbs now thick with foliage. "Because the water recedes, and the sun comes out, and the trees grow back. Because" -she spread her hands, indicated the garden and the trees and, I imagined, the entire peninsula of Biloxi- "because we've learned that great tragedy gives us opportunities for great kindness. It's like a needed reminder that the human spirit is alive and well despite all evidence to the contrary." She lowered her hands to her sides. "I figured I wasn't dead, so I must not be done ~ Karen White

No one should judge that he has greater perfection because he performs great penances and gives himself in excess to the staying of the body than he who does less, inasmuch as neither virtue nor merit consists therein; for otherwise he would be an evil case, who for some legitimate reason was unable to do actual penance. Merit consists in the virtue of love alone, flavored with the light of true discretion without which the soul is worth nothing. ~ St. Catherine Of Siena

Or you can start by declaring that novels can no longer be written, and then, behind your own back as it were, produce a mighty blockbuster that establishes you as the last of the great novelists. ~ Gunter Grass

The mind is the great poem of winter, the man,
Who, to find what will suffice,
Destroys romantic tenements
Of rose and ice ... ~ Wallace Stevens

A man must be disposed to judge of emancipation by other tests than whether it has increased the produce of sugar, - and to hate slavery for other reasons than because it starves men and whips women, - before he is ready to lay the first stone of his anti-slavery life. ~ Frederick Douglass

If we get to shoot the third one, which I'm really hoping we do, the third one's great. There's a big uprising and rebellion, and my character Gale's a big part of that. If we get to shoot that, I'll be very, very pleased. ~ Liam Hemsworth

The basis of drama is ... is the struggle of the hero towards a specific goal at the end of which he realizes that what kept him from it was, in the lesser drama, civilization and, in the great drama, the discovery of something that he did not set out to discover but which can be seen retrospectively as inevitable. The example Aristotle uses, of course, is Oedipus. ~ David Mamet

Every part of my body felt electric. My chest ached and my head throbbed with the great terrible limitless possibility of the morning, and when it came, the sky was washed white, everything was new, and I hadn't slept at all. ~ Dave Eggers

In the dead world of the Western mind all that is seen are shades of gray. There's a cloud over every experience. There's no possibility of divine incarnation, divine intervention, let alone that one's self in every moment is divine. ~ Frederick Lenz

In the great cities we see so little of the world, we drift into our minority. In the little towns and villages there are no minorities ; people are not numerous enough. You must see the world there, perforce. Every man is himself a class; every hour carries its new challenge. When you pass the inn at the end of the village you leave your favourite whimsy behind you; for you will meet no one who can share it. We listen to eloquent speaking, read books and write them, settle all the affairs of the universe. The dumb village multitudes pass on unchanging; the feel of the spade in the hand is no different for all our talk: good seasons and bad follow each other as of old. The dumb multitudes are no more concerned with us than is the old horse peering through the rusty gate of the village pound. The ancient map-makers wrote across unexplored regions, 'Here are lions.' Across the villages of fishermen and turners of the earth, so different are these from us, we can write but one line that is certain, 'Here are ghosts. ~ W.B. Yeats

Ink and parchment flowed through her veins. The magic of the Great Libraries lived in her very bones. They were a part of her, and she a part of them. ~ Margaret Rogerson

The last great attempt to free consciousness from the domination of impulses and social controls was psychoanalysis; as Freud pointed out, the two tyrants that fought for control over the mind were the id and the superago, the first a servant of a genes, the second a lackey of society - both representing the "Other". ~ Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

As I stood in contemplation of the garden of the wonders of space," Milosz writes, "I had the feeling that I was looking into the ultimate depths, the most secret regions of my own being; and I smiled, because it had never occurred to me that I could be so pure, so great, so fair! My heart burst into singing with the song of grace of the universe. All these constellations are yours, they exist in you; outside your love they have no reality! How terrible the world seems to those who do not know themselves! When you felt so alone and abandoned in the presence of the sea, imagine what solitude the waters must have felt in the night, or the night's own solitude in a universe without end!" And the poet continues this love duet between dreamer and world, making man and the world into two wedded creatures that are paradoxically united in the dialogue of their solitude. ~ Gaston Bachelard

The difference between average and good. Good and Great! Great and Phenomenal! It's their mindset! ~ Eric Thomas

But I will say this: the rule of no realm is mine, neither of Gondor nor any other, great or small. But all worthy things that are in peril as the world now stands, those are my care. And for my part, I shall not wholly fail of my task, though Gondor should perish, if anything passes through this night that can still grow fair or bear fruit and flower again in days to come. For I also am a steward. Did you not know?' And ~ J.R.R. Tolkien

I started doing some demos and got online and bought a refurbished laptop, bought a microphone off of eBay. A lot of folks said you can't really do it that way at a pro level, but I did some vocals that way, turned it into the label and they said, 'Wow, where did you record this? The vocals sound great!' ~ Rodney Atkins

I fantasised about F. Scott Fitzgerald's 'The Great Gatsby' - I loved it, and then I read everything J. D. Salinger had to offer. Then I was turned on to Kerouac, and his spontaneous prose, his stream of consciousness way of writing. I admired him so much, and I romanticised so much about the '40s and '50s. ~ Garrett Hedlund

I know what it takes to go from the point where someone's looking at a newspaper article, and thinking, 'Oh, this would make a great TV series,' to the point where you're actually on a set and there's a camera aimed at someone. ~ Wentworth Miller

From our sorrow we might seek out the sweetness and the good that is often associated with and peculiar to our challenge. We can seek out those memorable moments that are frequently hidden by the pain and agony. We can find peace in extending ourselves to others, using our own experiences to provide hope and comfort. And we can always remember with great solemnity and gratitude Him who suffered most to make it all right for us. And by so doing we can be strengthened to bear our burdens in peace. And then, the 'works of God' might be manifest. ~ Richard C. Edgley

We brought with hus in the ship a cat, a most amicable cat and greatly loved by us; but he grew to great bulk through the eating of fish. ~ Brendan

You'll present the right material to the wrong audience then set around blaming yourself for not being great enough. ~ Sherihan Gamal

I doubt that Fidel will ever come back to power. I think he is slowly going to the great beyond. Too slowly ... he could have gone a long time ago. ~ Gloria Estefan

I actually think there are lots of good matches for each person, and they cross our paths all the time, but we're so wedded to the idea of love at first sight that we can miss the really great people who don't come with a thunderbolt attached. ~ Jean Hanff Korelitz

I won't live in L.A. again, hell no, my friends tell me s**t when they come over I don't want to hear. I don't even know who got married and who got pregnant. You turn on the news in L.A. and it is all gossip about people. All the stuff that is going on in the world right now and this gossip is the news? ... I love the BBC. I haven't heard myself mentioned on TV since I have been here. That has been really weird for me, and great. ~ Lindsay Lohan

Nothing is more difficult than to equalize the action of the government in reference to the various and diversified interests of the community; and nothing more easy than to pervert its powers into instruments to aggrandize and enrich one or more interests by oppressing and impoverishing the others; and this, too, under the operation of laws couched in general terms - and which, on their face, appear fair and equal. Nor is this the case in some particular communities only. It is so in all - the small and the great, the poor and the rich - irrespective of pursuits, productions, or degrees of civilization; with, however, this difference, that the more extensive and populous the country, the more diversified the condition and pursuits of its population; and the richer, more luxurious, and dissimilar the people, the more difficult is it to equalize the action of the government, and the more easy for one portion of the community to pervert its powers to oppress and plunder the other. ~ John C. Calhoun

Esteban fell face downward upon the floor. "I am alone, alone, alone," he cried. The Captain stood above him, his great plain face ridged and gray with pain; it was his own old hours he was reliving. He was the awkwardest speaker in the world apart from the lore of the sea, but there are times when it requires a high courage to speak the banal. He could not be sure the figure on the floor was listening, but he said, "We do what we can. We push on, Esteban, as best we can. It isn't for long, you know. Time keeps going by. You'll be surprised at the way time passes. ~ Thornton Wilder