Quotes from Otto von Bismarck

Be polite; write diplomatically; even in a declaration of war one observes the rules of politeness.

I consider even a victorious war as an evil, from which statesmanship must endeavor to spare nations.

A little caution outflanks a large cavalry.

Show me an objective worthy of war and I will go along with you.

Nothing should be left to an invaded people except their eyes for weeping.

Let them stew in their own grease (or juice).

The great questions of the day will not be settled by means of speeches and majority decisions but by iron and blood

the main thing is to make history not to write it

People never lie so much as after a hunt, during a war, or before an election.

Better pointed bullets than pointed speeches.

(The great questions of the day) are not decided by speeches and majority votes but by blood and iron.

Only a fool learns from his own mistakes. The wise man learns from the mistakes of others.

It is the destiny of the weak to be devoured by the strong.

I am accustomed to pay men back in their own coin.

Vanity is a mortgage that must be deducted from the value of a man.

There is a Providence that protects idiots, drunkards, children and the United States of America.

"Hounds follow those who feed them."

Politics is not a science, as the professors are apt to suppose. It is an art.

Politics is the art of the possible.

Fools you are. To say you learn by your experience. I prefer to profit by others' mistakes and avoid the price of my own.

Crowned heads, wealth and privilege may well tremble should ever again the Black and Red unite!"-after the split between Anarchists and Marxists in 1872

When a man says he approves of something in principle, it means he hasn't the slightest intention of carrying it out in practice.

I have only one ambition left: I should like to have a good epitaph.

God has a special providence for fools, drunks, and the United States of America.