Napoleon Bonaparte Quotes
In statesmanship there are predicaments from which it is impossible to escape without some wrongdoing.
Bonaparte, Napoleon. Maximes et pensées du prisonnier de Sainte-Hélène. L'Huillier, 1820, p. 41.
This is a very important quotation. No one likes to make moral compromises, but Mann realized that there was a necessity in a complex society—especially a republic to make compromises. Politics cannot function without compromises of all kinds moral and otherwise as different people have different views of morality and rectitude. Mann observed that if compromises must be made, it is better for the politicians to make them than the educators, physicians, clerics, and other professional groups. Therefore politics takes the heat so that the other institutions of society do not have to. Thus politics has this crucial role among its others according to Mann.
Napoléon Bonaparte was a French military and political leader of Corsican descent. He rose to prominence during the French Revolution and led several successful campaigns during the Revolutionary Wars. As Napoleon I, he was Emperor of the French from 1804 until 1814, and again in 1815. Napoleon dominated European and global affairs for more than a decade while leading France against a series of coalitions in the Napoleonic Wars. He won most of these wars and the vast majority of his battles, building a large empire that ruled over continental Europe before its final collapse in 1815. One of the greatest commanders in history, his wars and campaigns are studied at military schools worldwide. He remains one of the most celebrated and controversial political figures in human history.
