"I say that there are three kinds of brains: one that understands things by itself, one that can appreciate what others understand, and one that understands neither by itself nor through others."

"Thus it happens in affairs of state, that to try to avoid one trouble often leads to another."

"To be feared is much safer than to be loved."

"He who is the cause of another becoming powerful is ruined; because that power has been effected either by industry or by force, and both of these are suspicious to the one who has been raised to powe…"

"There is no surer way of holding an acquired state than by ruining it."