Honore de Balzac Quotes

I shall rejoice on the day that you come here with troops... This land has grave need for your presence. There are a thousand abuses and political factions; but the moment you arrive all will disappear. Now they are sending a commission to you to propose a crown. Receive it as the infamous proposition deserves; and try, without resorting to the methods of Europe, to bring an end to this miserable existence at the hands of factions.

We believe in the rights of every individual to seek his fortune, in respect for others and in tolerance. Let us reply to the terrorists by resolutely living our values and by redoubling those values across all of Europe - now more than ever.

I believe that the future for a more effective, more efficient way of approaching the challenges Europe is facing is going to be more properly and more effectively handled and seen through the member states.

I do believe that Chancellor Merkel and Germany are a lynchpin in protecting the basic tenets of a liberal, market-based democratic order that has created unprecedented prosperity and security for Europe, but also for the world.

Europe has lived on its contradictions, flourished on its differences, and, constantly transcending itself thereby, has created a civilization on which the whole world depends even when rejecting it. This is why I do not believe in a Europe unified under the weight of an ideology or of a technocracy that overlooked these differences.

We believe in a flexible union of free member states who share treaties and institutions and pursue together the ideal of co-operation. To represent and promote the values of European civilisation in the world. To advance our shared interests by using our collective power to open markets. And to build a strong economic base across the whole of Europe.

The danger, though - and there have been signs of this recently - is that Europe begins to demonstrate a return to more nationalist sentiment. To my mind, that would be a great mistake.

I want to destroy the EU, not Europe! I believe in a Europe of nation-states. I believe in Airbus and Ariane, in a Europe based on cooperation. But I don't want this European Soviet Union.

We believe in a free Europe, not a standardised Europe. Diminish that variety within the member states, and you impoverish the whole Community. We insist that the institutions of the European Community are managed so that they increase the liberty of the individual throughout the continent. These institutions must not be permitted to dwindle into bureaucracy. Whenever they fail to enlarge freedom the institutions should be criticised and the balance restored.

I could not believe in a God that would challenge faith like this.

Europe was founded as a community bound together by solidarity.

When you're in my house you shall do as I do and believe who I believe in. So Bart butter your bacon.

There have, for years, been comparative studies of religious fanaticism and factors that correlate with it. By and large, it tends to decline with increasing industrialization and education. The US, however, is off the chart, ranking near devastated peasant societies. About 1/2 the population believe the world was created a few thousand years ago: the justification for the belief is that that is what they were ordered to believe by authority figures to whom they were taught one must subordinate oneself. And on, and on.

The State's your mother, your father, the totality of your interests. No discipline can be too severe for the man that denies thatby word or deed.

And I know you’re not supposed to say ‘Nazi Germany,’ but I don’t care about political correctness. You know, you had a government using its tools to intimidate the population. We now live in a society where people are afraid to say what they actually believe.

I work in lockstep, hand in glove, with the prime minister on these issues, and as we are supportive to the Eurozone so they can sort their problems out, in return they introduce safeguards to ensure precisely what I said: that the single market is not fragmented and that important industries like the financial services industry are treated fairly. Not exceptional treatment, but are just simply treated fairly, on a level playing field within Europe.

Feudal Europe is over, but it found its way into film culture. It found its way into postmodern painting culture, and we're all here talking about it today. It still lives. I don't believe in ghosts, but these are contemporary ghosts.

The heart of government, coated with whatever velvet gloves you want to put on it, is a mailed fist of force and coercion.

Considering the natural lust for power so inherent in man, I fear the thirst of power will prevail to oppress the people.

One must believe neither the people of the palace, who ordinarily measure the power of the king by the shape of his crown, which, being round, has no end, nor those who, in the excesses of an indiscreet zeal, proclaim themselves openly as partisans of Rome.

How could I share the way my heart was breaking when my confessor didn’t believe

The emperor would prefer the poet to keep away from politics, the emperor's domain, so that he can manage things the way he likes.

The Cold War began with the division of Europe. It can only end when Europe is whole.

Europe is war. Economic war. It is the increase of hostilities between the countries. Germans are denigrated as being cruel, the Greeks as fraudsters, the French as lazy. Ms. Merkel can't travel to any European country without being protected by hundreds of police. That is not brotherhood.

Despotic governments can stand 'moral force' till the cows come home; what they fear is physical force.