Chin-Ning Chu Quotes

Politics is the art of making the people believe that they are in power, when in fact, they have none.

To be flattered is grateful, even when we know that our praises are not believed by those who pronounce them; for they prove, at least, our power, and show that our favour is valued, since it is purchased by the meanness of falsehood.

A flatterer can risk everything with great personages.

It is the nature of carnivores to get power and then, having disposed of their enemies, to deploy the emollient powers of Great Art to make themselves look like herbivores.

Pretences go a great way with men that take fair words and magisterial looks for current payment.

The more things you know, or pretend to know, the more powerful you are. It doesn't matter if the things are true. What counts, remember, is to possess a secret.

Like the juggler, deceiving by his tricks, one is deluded by egotism, falsehood and illusion.

He had a certain air of being a handsome man-which he was not; and a certain air of being a well-bred man-which he was not. It was mere swagger and challenge; but in this particular, as in many others, blustering assertion goes for proof, half over the world.

Cats aren't really friendly, they're just cozying up to the dominant life-form as a hedge against extinction.

The ability to have our own way, and at the same time convince others they are having their own way, is a rare thing among men. Among women it is as common as eyebrows.

The conjuror or con man is a very good provider of information. He supplies lots of data, by inference or direct statement, but it's false data. Scientists aren't used to that scenario. An electron or a galaxy is not capricious, nor deceptive; but a human can be either or both.

Social Engineering - the art of replacing what works with what sounds good.

Sometimes I can't tell that someone is a selective asshole because they're so nice to me and the people around me that I don't realize it until someone else says, "You know, that person is an asshole." So I'll be fooled by selective assholes sometimes . . . lately.

All cats are not gray after midnight.

Clout is something some seem to have-until they try exercising it.

Every bird has its decoy, and every man is led and misled in his own peculiar way.

I have deceived my friends, and I had millions of them.

Like the actor, authority has faith in its false whiskers. But its deepest faith is in the human illusion. People will hang on to illusion as eagerly as life itself.

There is no subjection so perfect as that which keeps the appearance of freedom.

What use is it to endure the Dutch Rubs and Indian Rope Burns that are politics if you can't obtain mastery over people and give them noogies back?

I'm told I'm very charming when people do what I want.

I don't want them to believe me, I just want them to think.

Great men help dazzle the people; after that, they dazzle themselves even more dangerously.

What valor cannot win, flattery may.

The cat joined the Re-education Committee and was very active in it for some days. She was seen one dag sitting on a roof and talking to some sparrows who were just out of her reach. She was telling them that all animals were now comrades and that any sparrow who chose could come and perch on her paw; but the sparrows kept their distance.