Aphorisms

Laws are silent amid arms.

Civilization is a concerted effort to remedy the blunders and check the practical joking of God.

Diplomacy: the patriotic art of lying for one’s country.

Peace: in international affairs, a period of cheating between two periods of fighting.

Conservative: a statesman who is enamored of existing evils.

Battle: a method of untying with the teeth a political knot that would not yield to the tongue.

He who slays a king and he who dies for him are alike idolaters.