I treat policies like war. I hoodwink one flank so as to trounce the other. In my family we kneel only to God. Soldiers consider that from the summit of these pyramids, forty centuries look down upon you. Unavailable wars are always just.
Clever policy consists in making nations believe they are free.
The Concordat is not the victory of any one party but the consolidation of all. I could marry the Virgin Mary without shocking the Parisians. In the eyes of those who found empires , men are not men but tools. The empire is an old serving woman who is used to being raped by everyone. My star was fading, I felt the reins slipping out of my grasp, and could do nothing to stop it.