Great Empires Quotes

All who have meditated on the art of governing mankind have been convinced that the fate of empires depends on the education of youth. ~ Aristotle.

Great persons, like great empires, leave their mark on history. ~ Janet Wallach

The same sand currents had swallowed up and destroyed flourishing cities and great empires. They called it the "sabulation" of the Roman Empire, if he remembered rightly. ~ Kobo Abe

It's always been the case that you have the really rich, and the really poor. But hey, look, all the great empires have their periods where they rule the world, and then they crumble. ~ Mickey Rourke

Europe is a molehill. All great empires and revolutions have been on the Orient; six hundred millions live there. ~ Napoleon Bonaparte

She is the centre of my world. The Armenians believed that Ararat was the centre of the world; but the mountain was divided between three great empires, and the Armenians ended up with none of it, so I shan't continue this comparison. I love you. ~ Julian Barnes

Posterity will talk of Washington as the founder of a great empire, when my name shall be lost in the vortex of revolution. ~ Napoleon Bonaparte

The sneaking arts of underling tradesmen are thus erected into political maxims for the conduct of a great empire; for it is the most underling tradesmen only who make it a rule to employ chiefly their own customers. A great trader purchases his good always where they are cheapest and best, without regard to any little interest of this kind. ~ Adam Smith

But if we are to remain a great empire, we must have a greater understanding of the hearts and minds of others. ~ Libba Bray

To found a great empire for the sole purpose of raising up a people of customers, may at first sight appear a project fit only for a nation of shopkeepers. It is, however, a project altogether unfit for a nation of shopkeepers; but extremely fit for a nation whose government is influenced by shopkeepers. ~ Adam Smith

A great empire, like a great cake, is most easily diminished at the edges. ~ Benjamin Franklin

Is it not the same virtue which does everything for us here in England? Do you imagine, then, that it is the Land Tax Act which raises your revenue? that it is the annual vote in the Committee of Supply which gives you your army? or that it is the Mutiny Bill which inspires it with bravery and discipline? No! surely no! It is the love of the people; it is their attachment to their government, from the sense of the deep stake they have in such a glorious institution, which gives you your army and your navy, and infuses into both that liberal obedience without which your army would be a base rabble, and your navy nothing but rotten timber.
All this, I know well enough, will sound wild and chimerical to the profane herd of those vulgar and mechanical politicians who have no place among us; a sort of people who think that nothing exists but what is gross and material, and who, therefore, far from being qualified to be directors of the great movement of empire, are not fit to turn a wheel in the machine. But to men truly initiated and rightly taught, these ruling and master principles which, in the opinion of such men as I have mentioned, have no substantial existence, are in truth everything, and all in all. Magnanimity in politics is not seldom the truest wisdom; and a great empire and little minds go ill together. ~ Edmund Burke

All of the great empires of the future will be empires of the mind. ~ Winston S. Churchill

From the days of the Assyrians and the Qin, great empires were usually built through violent conquest. In 1914 too, all the major powers owed their status to successful wars. For instance, Imperial Japan became a regional power thanks to its victories over China and Russia; Germany became Europe's top dog after its triumphs over Austria-Hungary and France; and Britain created the world's largest and most prosperous empire through a series of splendid little wars all over the planet. Thus in 1882 Britain invaded and occupied Egypt, losing a mere fifty-seven soldiers in the decisive Battle of Tel el-Kebir. Whereas in our days occupying a Muslim country is the stuff of Western nightmares, following Tel el-Kebir the British faced little armed resistance, and for more than six decades controlled the Nile Valley and the vital Suez Canal. Other European powers emulated the British, and whenever governments in Paris, Rome or Brussels contemplated putting boots on the ground in Vietnam, Libya or Congo, their only fear was that somebody else might get there first.
Even the United States owed its great-power status to military action rather than economic enterprise alone. In 1846 it invaded Mexico, and conquered California, Nevada, Utah, Arizona, New Mexico and parts of Colorado, Kansas, Wyoming and Oklahoma. The peace treaty also confirmed the previous US annexation of Texas. About 13,000 American soldiers died in the war, which added 2.3 million square kilometres to the "United S ~ Yuval Noah Harari

In India, as we saw, the Sepoy Mutiny led to a vast reorganization of British colonialism in the area, sending out a viceroy from London and before too long, Queen Victoria was proclaimed "Empress of India," with this great empire, ruling over maharajahs and other local potentates. ~ Webster Tarpley

The face of the earth is continually changing, by the encrease of small kingdoms into great empires, by the dissolution of great empires into smaller kingdoms, by the planting of colonies, by the migration of tribes. Is there any thing discoverable in all these events, but force and violence? Where is the mutual agreement or voluntary association so much talked of? ~ David Hume

Sindhu but other great empires ~ Amish Tripathi

Would you have a great empire? Rule over yourself. ~ Publilius Syrus

Elyon was restoring the Great Romance. Teeleh had stolen his first love, but now Justin had reclaimed her. The price had been his own life. He'd taken her disease on himself and he'd drowned with it, inviting them to embrace his invitation to the Romance by following him into the lake to drown with him. To live as his bride! ~ Ted Dekker

Los Angeles is such a great meritocracy. Where can someone with my background - don't have the right family background, the right religion, the right provenance or whatever you want to call it - I come here and I'm accepted. The city's been good to me. And I want to give back. ~ Eli Broad

We can not communicate with the Lord if we do not communicate with each other. If we want to present ourselves to him, we must take a step towards meeting one another. To do this we must learn the great lesson of forgiveness: we must not let the gnawings of resentment work in our soul but must open our hearts to the magnanimity of listening to others, open our hearts to understanding them, eventually to accepting their apologies, to generously offering our own. ~ Pope Benedict XVI

Let us read thoughtfully; this is a great secret in the right use of books. ~ George Gilfillan

All great deeds and all great thoughts have a ridiculous beginning. Great works are often born on a street corner or in a restaurant's revolving door. ~ Albert Camus

Inspiration doesn't lie on the sleeves of great leaders, but it is instead hidden in the hearts of the simple souls who seldom show the potential they carry with them. ~ Sanhita Baruah

It is pleasant to be admitted into the birth-chamber of a great idea destined to be translated into action. ~ Augustine Birrell

A great mind is a good sailor, as a great heart is. ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

The extraordinary mystique of hers made you think she lived on rose petals and listened to nothing but Mozart, but it wasn't true. She was quite funny and ribald. She could tell a dirty joke. She played charades with a great sense of fun and vulgarity, and she could be quite bitchy. ~ Andre Previn

I felt that I had been born anew and that the gates of heaven had been opened. The whole of Scripture gained a new meaning. And from that point on the phrase, 'the justice of God' no longer filled me with hatred, but rather became unspeakable sweet by virtue of a great love. ~ Martin Luther

The canvases which Mr. St. Jones referred to with a paintbrush that was long and slightly bowed: for the most part interiors, or undergrounds, of pocked and craggy holes, rock vaults with mossy floors and slimy walls, or narrow scenic vistas that skinny silver streams squirmed through like sidewinders flipped on their backs, beneath downward grasping tentacles of roots, stalactites dagger-sharp and dangling by threads of stone, stalagmites teetering, all doused, frozen in molten electric white that suggested what a glimpse of hell might be, too beautiful, some still lifes too, great bulbous beets, hoary legumes, giant scallions, white carrots, tomatoes, berries, squash in huge radiant bowls, and portraits, signed by Ionia, of shadows, from which gleamed eyes and teeth and nails and, here and there, a glowing bubble, or scrotum, caught the eye. Near the door a counter clacked but rather quietly. ~ Douglas Woolf

What answer had your lecturer in Moscow to make to the question why he was forging notes? 'Everybody is getting rich one way or another, so I want to make haste to get rich too.' I don't remember the exact words, but the upshot was that he wants money for nothing, without waiting or working! We've grown used to having everything ready-made, to walking on crutches, to having our food chewed for us. Then the great hour struck, and every man showed himself in his true colours. ~ Fyodor Dostoyevsky

It is not the genius at the top giving directions that makes people great. It is great people that make the guy at the top look like a genius. ~ Simon Sinek

Successfully reframing the climate debate in the United States from one based on environmental values to one based on health values ... holds great promise to help American society better understand and appreciate the risks of climate change ... ~ George Mason

It was the red vision of the revolution, which would one day inevitably carry them all away, on some bloody evening at the end of the century. Yes, some evening the people, unbridled at last, would thus gallop along the roads, making the blood of the middle class flow, parading severed heads and sprinkling gold from disembowelled coffers. The women would yell, the men would have those wolf-like jaws open to bite. Yes, the same rags, the same thunder of great sabots, the same terrible troop, with dirty skins and tainted breath, sweeping away the old world beneath an overflowing flood of barbarians. ~ Emile Zola

Among those dazzled by the Administration team was Vice-President Lyndon Johnson. After attending his first Cabinet meeting he went back to his mentor Sam Rayburn and told him with great enthusiasm how extraordinary they were, each brighter than the next, and that the smartest of them all was that fellow with the Stacomb on his hair from the Ford Motor Company, McNamara. "Well, Lyndon," Mister Sam answered, "you may be right and they may be every bit as intelligent as you say, but I'd feel a whole lot better about them if just one of them had run for sheriff once." It is my favorite story in the book, for it underlines the weakness of the Kennedy team, the difference between intelligence and wisdom, between the abstract quickness and verbal fluency which the team exuded, and the true wisdom, which is the product of hard-won, often bitter experience. Wisdom for a few of them came after Vietnam. ~ David Halberstam

It is a sign of great inner insecurity to be hostile to the unfamiliar. ~ Anais Nin

The Great Gatsby' [ ... ] was my 'Tom Sawyer' when I was twelve [ ... ] ~ J.D. Salinger

Any film that supports the idea that things can be changed is a great film in my eyes. ~ Wim Wenders

No one is capable of loving you like you can love you. Embrace your uniqueness; your uniqueness is what makes you special and great. ~ Shay Dawkins

To be a great player, you have to
affect the entire unit. ~ Nick Saban

Others, faced with Turner's competitiveness were less contented. C.R. Leslie was on hand when Turner's Helvoetsluys, to start with "a grey pictre, beautiful and true, but with no positive colour in any part of it", was hung next to Constable's Opening of Waterloo Bridge Leslie wrote that Constable's painting looked as if painted with liquid gold and silver, and Turner came several times into the room while Constable was heightening with vermilion and lake the decorations and flags of the city barges. Turner stood behind Constable, looking from "Waterloo" to his own picture, and at last went and got his palette from the Great Room where he had been touching another picture. He then put a round daub of red lead,

"somewhat bigger than a shilling, on his grey sea, [and] went away without saying a word. The intensity of the red lead, made more vivid by the coolness of his picture, caused even the vermilion and lake of Constable to look weak. I came into the room just as Turner left it. "He as been here," Said Constable, "and fired a gun. ~ Anthony Bailey

Body and mind, and spirit, all combineTo make the Creature, human and divine.Of this great trinity no part deny.Affirm, affirm, the Great Eternal I. ~ Ella Wheeler Wilcox

I have a limitless amount of great music at my disposal and it's very, very pleasurable because when the music goes on the film it's amazing how much it livens up the film and gives it an emotional kick in the pants, sort of. ~ Woody Allen

In Great Britain, woman was subordinate and confined. But at least she was also safe. ~ Linda Colley

You know what? It's a great conversation starter, right? You meet friends that way. Sometimes it's a good thing. And then other times, I guess, the person is just a little too ... then you kind of like want to back away. It depends on the person, you know? ~ Alison Lohman

Much like great products, great content will only find the best people to love it if it's leveraged well. ~ Paul Shannon

Great commanders look for decision points. For it is bursts of energy directed at decisive points that break things wide open. They ~ Ryan Holiday

I mean, why am I considered an 'it girl?' Because I'm in a lot of movies right now or am on the covers of magazines? I just hope there is something solid behind that. Because here's the thing with 'it girl' status. It's great and amazing that anybody is saying that at all. But how long does that last? ~ Amanda Seyfried

After college, I funded my short films with acting roles in film and TV. I learned my craft through the great opportunities British television gave me as a director. ~ Justin Chadwick

Remember Haydn's 104 symphonies. Not all of them were great. But there were 104 of them. ~ Raymond Carver

I saw you fall. Are you okay?" he asked. "Yup, great," I said, forcing a smile. "Dancing One, Dawn Zero. ~ Ada Adams

Big box just wasn't our strength. We are a men's and boy's specialty store focused on providing high quality clothing with custom tailoring. Our customer is king. When we had seven stores, communication between the stores and with our customers became more disconnected. We started to lose that great family 'camaraderie' that is essentially the key to our success. ~ Paul Simon

The radicals are really always saying the same thing. They do not change; everybody else changes. They are accused of the most incompatible crimes, of egoism and mania for power, indifference to the fate of their own cause, fanaticism, triviality, want of humor, buffoonery and irreverence. But they sound a certain note. Hence the great practical power of consistent radicals. To all appearance nobody follows them, yet everyone believes them. They hold a tuning-fork and sound A, and everybody knows it really is A, though the time-honored pitch is G flat. The community cannot get that A out of its head. Nothing can prevent an upward tendency in the popular tone so long as the real A is kept sounding. ~ John Jay Chapman

I was never pegged to be the next great American tennis player by any means. I wasn't a prodigy. I'm a late bloomer. Whatever happens, I'm proud of what I've done. ~ John Isner

Who can mistake great thoughts? They seize upon the mind; arrest and search, And shake it; bow the tall soul as by wind; Rush over it like a river reeds. ~ Philip James Bailey

Yeah, I'd say there's probably about a couple of hundred people I admire - but that has nothing to do with what a person does themselves. That's why I never mention these things. You can read a detective novel you really like, but it had no bearing on what you do yourself, you just think, "God, how this guy wove this together!" Or you get into the energy of it. Or you see a poem which makes a great statement about sentiment, but it's not sentimental. ~ Tom Verlaine

When you sing and people want that you sing, then you can hope to be great. ~ Andrea Bocelli

Cult leaders are often self-styled prophets who have not studied with great teachers or undergone lengthy training or discipline themselves ... Many of the most dangerous cultic figures of our times have no such stabilizing context of tradition, lineage or transmission, but are self-proclaimed gurus who sway their followers through their charismatic talents ... ~ John Welwood

Great companies don't hire skilled people and motivate them, they hire already motivated people and inspire them. ~ Simon Sinek

Other nations of different habits are not enemies: they are godsends. Men require of their neighbours something sufficiently akin to be understood, something sufficiently different to provoke attention, and something great enough to command admiration. We must not expect, however, all the virtues. ~ Alfred North Whitehead

All of the great sounds that James Burton and Jimmy Bryant were getting, came out of Telecasters ~ Albert Lee

Or there were the poets and thinkers. Suppose he had had that passion, and had gone to Sir William Bradshaw, a great doctor yet to her extremely evil, without sex or lust, extremely polite to women, but capable of some indescribable outrage - forcing your soul, that was it - if this young man had gone to him, and Sir William impressed him, like that, with his power, might he not then have said (indeed she felt it now), Life is made intolerable; they make life intolerable, men like that? ~ Virginia Woolf

He [Sam] wrote it with great flourishes, his hand making many dizzy elliptical journeys before it settled down to make a elaborate 'E' with a curving tail as long as some prehistoric baboons. ~ Bess Streeter Aldrich

If my work has taught me anything, it is this: While a great many curiosities can be explained using thorough scientific research and sound logic, there are a handful of them that resist such easy hypothesis. These mysteries tend to be the most human. The most important.
Chief among them is love. ~ Sarah MacLean

The explanation, said Mr Glowry, is very satisfactory. The Great Mogul has taken lodgings at Kensington, and the external part of the ear is a cartilaginous funnel. ~ Thomas Love Peacock