A Spanish politician in a political meeting said it for the first time and attributed to Bismarck https://es.wikiquote.org/wiki/Discusi%C3%B3n:Otto_von_Bismarck
Misattributed
Otto von Bismarck:
35
quotes
31
likes
Famous Otto von Bismarck Quotes
Talking to Gyula Andrássy in Salzburg on 18 September 1877. As quoted in Disraeli, Gladstone, and the Eastern Question. A Study in Diplomacy and Party Politics (1935) by Robert William Seton-Watson, p. 224 books.google http://books.google.de/books?id=5CPVAAAAMAAJ&q=fox; "Schlaukopf" is translated elsewhere as "clever dick" or "smart aleck."
With deal (instead of do) with a pirate, in Prime Minister Gyula Andrássy's influence on Habsburg foreign policy during the Franco-German War of 1870-1871 (1979) by János Decsy, p. 21 http://books.google.de/books?id=JtUhAAAAMAAJ&q=111
„Man behandelt mich wie einen Fuchs, wie einen Schlaukopf erster Klasse. Die Wahrheit aber ist, qu'avec un gentleman je suis toujours gentleman et demi, et que quand j'ai affaire à un corsaire, je tâche d'etre corsaire et demi"
:Eduard von Wertheimer: Graf Julius Andrássy. Sein Leben und seine Zeit. Vol. III. Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt Stuttgart 1914 pp. 42-43 http://books.google.de/books?id=2skhAAAAMAAJ&q=demi
1870s
No record of this quotation appears to exist in German.
In The World Crisis, Vol I: 1911-1914 https://books.google.com/books?id=6l6Fgnz8fXIC&lpg=PP1&pg=PA96#v=onepage&q&f=false (originally published in 1923), Winston Churchill asserted that during the July Crisis, German shipping magnate and diplomat Albert Ballin told him that Bismarck had said to him, "that one day the great European War would come out of some damned foolish thing in the Balkans" a year before his death.
The full quote above appears in "European Diary" by Andrei Navrozov, in Chronicles Vol. 32 (2008) as a comment during the Congress of Berlin in 1878. "European Diary" is a series of excerpts from Navrozov's unpublished (as of 2017) novel in English, Earthly Love: A Day in the Life of a Hypocrite.
Disputed
“Who is master of Bohemia is master of Europe.”
Reported as frequently quoted but unverified in Respectfully Quoted: A Dictionary of Quotations (1989), which states, "it cannot be found in the official writings and pronouncements of Bismarck. It is possible that he said it, and it was passed on orally rather than being recorded, or that he expressed the sentiment in other terms and the idea took this form as others tried to quote him".
Disputed
“He who has his thumb on the purse has the power.”
Wer den Daumen auf dem Beutel hat, der hat die Macht.
Speech to North German Reichstag (21 May 1869), Stenographische Berichte p. 1017 (left) http://books.google.de/books?id=wm9HAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA1017
1860s
Mein lieber Professor, ein solcher Krieg hätte uns wenigstens 30,000 Mann brave Soldaten gekostet, und uns im besten Falle keinen Gewinn gebracht. Wer aber nur ein Mal in das brechende Auge eines sterbenden Kriegers auf dem Schlachtfeld geblickt hat, der besinnt sich, bevor er einen Krieg anfängt.
In June 1867, protecting the Treaty of London
1860s
Otto von Bismarck Quotes about God
Wir Deutsche fürchten Gott, aber sonst nichts in der Welt - und die Gottesfurcht ist es schon, die uns den Frieden lieben und pflegen lässt.
Speech to the Reichstag (6 February 1888) reichstagsprotokolle.de 1887/88,2 http://www.reichstagsprotokolle.de/Blatt3_k7_bsb00018648_00043.html p. 733 (D)
1880s
Haut doch die Polen, daß sie am Leben verzagen; ich habe alles Mitgefühl für ihre Lage, aber wir können, wenn wir bestehn wollen, nichts andres tun, als sie ausrotten; der Wolf kann auch nicht dafür, daß er von Gott geschaffen ist, wie er ist, und man schießt ihn doch dafür totd, wenn man kann.
Letter to his sister Malwine (26/14 March 1861), published in Bismarck-Briefe (Second edition Göttingen 1955), edited by Hans Rothfels, p. 276 http://books.google.de/books?id=oIkkkcUIfqMC&pg=PA276; as quoted in Hajo Holborn: A History of Modern Germany 1840-1945 (1969), p. 165 http://books.google.de/books?id=rUgOAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA165
1860s
As quoted in A. J. P. Taylor, Bismarck: The Man and the Statesman (1955), p. 115
Undated
Otto von Bismarck Quotes
Nicht durch Reden und Majoritätsbeschlüsse werden die großen Fragen der Zeit entschieden — daß ist der große Fehler von 1848 und 1849 gewesen — sondern durch Eisen und Blut.
Variant translations :
: It is not by speeches and majority vote that the great questions of our time will be decided — as that was error of 1848 and 1849 — but rather by iron and blood.
The great questions of the time are not decided by speeches and majority decisions — that was the error of 1848 and 1849 — but by iron and blood.
The great issues of the day are not decided through speeches and majority resolutions — that was the great error of 1848 and 1849 — but through blood and iron.
The great questions of the day will not be decided by speeches and the resolutions of majorities — that was the great mistake from 1848 to 1849 — but by blood and iron.
The great questions of the day will not be settled by means of speeches and majority decisions … but by iron and blood.
Speech to the Budget Commission of the Prussian Diet (30 September 1862), published in Fürst Bismarck als Redner, Vol. 2 (after 1881), edited by Wilhelm Böhm, p. 12 http://books.google.de/books?id=3WsIAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA12); after some objections to his initial speech Bismarck returned to the podium and declared:
::Auswärtige Conflicte zu suchen, um über innere Schwierigkeiten hinwegzukommen, dagegen müsse er sich verwahren; das würde frivol sein; er wolle nicht Händel suchen ; er spreche von Conflicten, denen wir nicht entgehen würden, ohne daß wir sie suchten.
:: I must protest that I would never seek foreign conflicts just to go over domestic difficulties; that would be frivolous. I was speaking of conflicts that we could not avoid, even though we do not seek them.
::* Die Reden des Ministerpräsidenten von Bismarck-Schönhausen im Preußischen Landtage 1862-1865 (1903) edited by Horst Kohl, p. 31
1860s
“There is a special providence for drunkards, fools, and the United States of America.”
This saying appears as early as 1849 in the form "the special providence over the United States and little children", attributed to Abbé Correa. There is no good evidence that Bismarck ever repeated it. See talk page for more details.
Misattributed
As quoted in Bismarck: The Man and the Statesman (1955) by A. J. P. Taylor, p. 12. Cf. Goethe, Faust, Part I: Zwei Seelen wohnen, ach! in meiner Brust, / Die eine will sich von der andern trennen ("Two souls, alas! reside within my breast, / and each is eager for a separation").
Faust klagt über die zwei Seelen in seiner Brust; ich beherberge aber eine ganze Menge, die sich zanken. Es geht da zu wie in einer Republik... Das meiste, was sie sagen, teile ich mit. Es sind da aber auch ganze Provinzen, in die ich nie einen andern Menschen werde hineinsehen lassen.
:*Bismarck traveling in an open carriage through the green valley of Hofgastein to Salzburg with Vortragender Rat Robert von Keudell and Geheimrat Heinrich Abeken on 18 August 1865 after the Gastein Convention had been signed on 14 August 1865 (as reported by Keudell). Bismarck: Die gesammelten Werke, Band 7 Gespräche, 1924, p. 101 https://books.google.de/books?id=mMkTAAAAQAAJ&q=seelen
1860s
“A conquering army on the border will not be stopped by eloquence.”
Speech to North German Reichstag (24 September 1867)
1860s
Der alte Jude, das ist der Mann.
A conversation in 1879 on who was the centre of gravity at the Congress of Berlin, referring to Benjamin Disraeli, as quoted in Seven Great Statesmen in the Warfare of Humanity with Unreason (1912) by Andrew Dickson White, p. 482
1870s
Discussing the w:Emin Pasha Relief Expedition with Eugen Wolf on 5 December 1888
:„Ihre Karte von Afrika ist ja sehr schön, aber meine Karte von Afrika liegt in Europa. Hier liegt Rußland, und hier" - nach links deutend - "liegt Frankreich, und wir sind in der Mitte; das ist meine Karte von Afrika."
::Eugen Wolf: Vom Fürsten Bismarck und seinem Haus. Tagebuchblätter. 2nd edition Berlin 1904, p. 16 archive.org http://archive.org/stream/vomfrstenbismar00wolfgoog#page/n34/mode/2up
1880s
“At no time there is more lying than before the elections, during the war and after the hunt.”
The earliest attestation is: A representative of the "Löwe faction" also aptly remarked: "There is never more lying than before the elections, during the war and after the hunt.", in: Im neuen Reich. Wochenschrift für das Leben des deutschen Volkes in Staat, Wissenschaft und Kunst. Volume 9 (1879), 1st semivolume, p. 199 books.google http://books.google.de/books?hl=de&id=TO0aAAAAYAAJ&q=jagd.
The witticism was first attributed to Bismarck in printed form, as far as it is clear, in Zeitschrift für Bekämpfung der Geschlechtskrankheiten. Im Auftrage der Deutschen Gesellschaft zur Bekämpfung der Geschlechtskrankheiten. Volume 2 (1904) p. 283 books.google http://books.google.de/books?id=ZwETAQAAMAAJ&q=jagd: "[...] when Bismarck would have repeated his well-known word about the instances in which the most lying occurs, out of the three mentioned by him (before an election, during a war, after a hunt), he would certainly have to put pelvic inflammatory disease in women first."
Before this, it always went without naming an author as a "witticism" in 1895 http://books.google.de/books?id=stoYAQAAIAAJ&q=gelogen, as "the proverbial answer to the question when the most lying occurs" in 1897 http://books.google.de/books?id=ZkoxAQAAMAAJ&q=gelogen, as "an old story" in 1898 http://books.google.de/books?id=LzkZAAAAYAAJ&q=%22einer+jagd%22 and as "what one usually says" in 1901 http://books.google.de/books?id=sjsZAAAAYAAJ&q=gelogen. Die Neue Zeit - Wochenschrift der deutschen Sozialdemokratie even spoke of a "self-admission" of Bismarck in 1906 http://books.google.de/books?id=YtY5AQAAMAAJ&q=gelogen; however, the fellow social democratic magazine Das freie Wort attributed it to an unnamed representative of the Zentrumspartei in that same year http://books.google.de/books?id=LjQ8AQAAIAAJ&q=%22mehr+gelogen%22.
Misattributed
Original: "Es wird niemals so viel gelogen wie vor der Wahl, während des Krieges und nach der Jagd."
“Crowned heads, wealth and privilege may well tremble should ever again the Black and Red unite!”
Frequently quoted in online leftist circles. Refers to the split of the First Internationale (between anarchists and socialists). The earliest mention is on page 95 of American radicalism, 1865-1901, essays and documents https://hdl.handle.net/2027/mdp.39015011722785?urlappend=%3Bseq=111 (1946) by Chester McArthur Destler, but as of now the German original could not be found.
In German political parlance, "black" more often referred to Catholic interests than to anarchism; it is possible that if Bismarck did say this, it referred rather to a union between the Catholic Center and the Socialist "reds" against the German nationalist/Protestant "blues."
Disputed
“Preventive war is like committing suicide for fear of death.”
Quoted as a remark of Bismark without quotation marks, in Thinking About the Unthinkable in the 1980s (1984) by Herman Kahn, p. 136, a paraphrase of what Bismarck told the Reichstag on Feb. 9, 1876. Referring to March 1875, when the French National Assembly had decided to strengthen their army by 144,000 additional troops, Bismarck asked the deputies to imagine he had told them a year ago that one had to wage war without having been attacked or humiliated: „Würden Sie da nicht sehr geneigt gewesen sein, zunächst nach dem Arzte zu schicken (Heiterkeit), um untersuchen zu lassen, wie ich dazu käme, dass ich nach meiner langen politischen Erfahrung die kolossale Dummheit begehen könnte, so vor Sie zu treten und zu sagen: Es ist möglich, dass wir in einigen Jahren einmal angegriffen werden, damit wir dem nun zuvorkommen, fallen wir rasch über unsere Nachbarn her und hauen sie zusammen, ehe sie sich vollständig erholen – gewissermaßen Selbstmord aus Besorgniß vor dem Tode" (Would you not have been inclined very much to send for a physician in the first place and let him find out, how I with my long experience in politics could commit the colossal stupidity of [...] telling you: It is possible that in some years we might be attacked; to pre-empt that, let us overrun our neighbors and smash them before they have fully recovered [from the war of 1870/71] - in a way [commit] suicide from fear of death) reichstagsprotokolle.de 1875/76,2 http://www.reichstagsprotokolle.de/Blatt3_k2_bsb00018381_00571.html p. 1329-30
1870s
Setzen wir Deutschland, so zu sagen, in den Sattel! Reiten wird es schon können.
Speech to Parliament of Confederation (1867)
1860s
“Laws, like sausages, cease to inspire respect in proportion as we know how they are made”
Gesetze sind wie Würste, man sollte besser nicht dabei sein, wenn sie gemacht werden
Though similar remarks are often attributed to Bismarck, this is the earliest known quote regarding laws and sausages, and is attributed to John Godfrey Saxe University Chronicle. University of Michigan (27 March 1869) books.google http://books.google.de/books?id=cEHiAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA164 and "Quote... Misquote" http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/21/magazine/27wwwl-guestsafire-t.html by Fred R. Shapiro in The New York Times (21 July 2008); according to Shapiro's research, such remarks only began to be attributed to Bismarck in the 1930s.
Variants often attributed to Bismarck:
If you like laws and sausages, you should never watch either one being made.
Laws are like sausages — it is best not to see them being made.
Laws are like sausages. It is better not to see them being made.
Laws are like sausages. You should never see them made.
Laws are like sausages. You should never watch them being made.
Law and sausage are two things you do not want to see being made.
No one should see how laws or sausages are made.
To retain respect for sausages and laws, one must not watch them in the making.
The making of laws like the making of sausages, is not a pretty sight.
Je weniger die Leute darüber wissen, wie Würste und Gesetze gemacht werden, desto besser schlafen sie nachts.
The less the people know about how sausages and laws are made, the better they sleep in the night.
No citation exists for where this German phrase or this translation originated.
Misattributed
“Politics is the art of the possible.”
Franklin says this line in the HBO miniseries John Adams, but it is actually a quote of Otto von Bismarck.
(de) Die Politik ist die Lehre vom Möglichen. Interview (11 August 1867) with Friedrich Meyer von Waldeck of the St. Petersburgische Zeitung: Aus den Erinnerungen eines russischen Publicisten. 2. Ein Stündchen beim Kanzler des norddeutschen Bundes.
In: Die Gartenlaube (1876) p. 858 de.wikisource. Reprinted in Fürst Bismarck: neue Tischgespräche und Interviews, Vol. 1, p. 248 http://books.google.com/books?id=UpUBAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA248&dq=%22die+Politik+ist+die+Lehre+vom+Möglichen%22
Ref: en.wikiquote.org - Otto von Bismarck / Quotes / 1860s
Misattributed
“Politics is not an exact science.”
Die Politik ist keine exakte Wissenschaft.
Speech to Prussian upper house (18 December 1863)
Politics is not a science, as the professors are apt to suppose. It is an art.
Expression in the Reichstag (1884), as quoted in The Quote Verifier : Who Said What, Where, and When (2006) by Ralph Keyes
1860s
Variant: Die Politik ist keine Wissenschaft, wie viele der Herren Proffessoren sich einbilden, sondern eine Kunst.
The Kaiser vs. Bismarck. Suppressed Letters by the Kaiser and New Chapters from the Autobiography of the Iron Chancellor. Translated by Bernard Miall. Harper New York & London 1921,
Original: (de) Ueber die Fehler, welche in der auswärtigen Politik begangen wurden, wird sich die öffentliche Meinung in der Regel erst klar, wenn sie auf die Geschichte eines Menschenalters zurückzublicken im Stande ist, und die Achivi qui plectuntur sind nicht immer die unmittelbaren Zeitgenossen der fehlerhaften Handlungen.
Source: p. 183 archive.org http://archive.org/stream/kaiservsbismarck00bismuoft#page/n223. Achivi qui plectuntur refers to the proverbial verse "Quidquid delirant reges, plectuntur Achivi" from Horace's Epistles Liber I Epistula II la.wikisource http://la.wikisource.org/wiki/Epistulae_(Horatius)_-_Liber_I: Whatever their kings are raging the Achaeans have to pay for.
Source: Otto von Bismarck: Gedanken und Erinnerungen chapter 12 zeno.org http://www.zeno.org/nid/20002732971
Volume I, pp. 17–18
Bismarck: The Man and the Statesman
Speech to a Deputation from Syria (15 April 1895), quoted in W. W. Coole (ed.), Thus Spake Germany (London: George Routledge & Sons, 1941), p. 104
1890s
Letter to the Bundesrath committee on tariff revision (15 December 1878), quoted in Percy Ashley, Modern Tariff History: Germany–United States–France (1970), pp. 45–46
1870s
“Be assured, we shall not go to Canossa, either bodily or spiritually.”
Seien Sie außer Sorge, nach Kanossa gehen wir nicht, weder körperlich noch geistig.
Speech to the Reichstag (14 May 1872), Ausgewählte Reden des Fürsten von Bismarck: p. 176 https://books.google.com/books?id=nsjCDgAAQBAJ&pg=PA176&lpg=PA176&dq=Kanossa-rede&source=bl&ots=f3X5xq7raK&sig=Y86H5ZlgredQfpC3Wa_AB2Z-fOM&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiIhrCn56zaAhVs3IMKHdBnAWwQ6AEIQTAC#v=onepage&q=Kanossa-rede&f=false, referring to the controversy over the Imperial envoy to the Holy See, Prince Hohenlohe, who had been rejected by Pope Pius IX, which marked the beginning of the Prussian Kulturkampf. The expression highlighted an era of political struggle between the Catholic Church and various secular governments, especially severe throughout the 1870s.
1870s
“The social insecurity of the worker is the real cause of their being a perishable to the state.”
Speech to the Landtag (18 October 1849), quoted in Henry E. Sigerist, 'From Bismarck to Beveridge: Developments and Trends in Social Security Legislation', Journal of Public Health Policy, Vol. 20, No. 4 (1999), p. 484
1840s
As quoted in W. H. Dawson, Bismarck and State Socialism: An Exposition of the Social and Economic Legislation of Germany since 1870 (London: Swan Sonnenschein & Co., 1891), p. 54
Undated
Speech to the Reichstag (14 June 1882), quoted in W. H. Dawson, Bismarck and State Socialism: An Exposition of the Social and Economic Legislation of Germany since 1870 (London: Swan Sonnenschein & Co., 1891), p. 32
1880s
Speech to the Reichstag (28 March 1881), quoted in W. H. Dawson, Bismarck and State Socialism: An Exposition of the Social and Economic Legislation of Germany since 1870 (London: Swan Sonnenschein & Co., 1891), p. 54
1880s
Speech to the Prussian United Diet (15 June 1847), quoted in W. H. Dawson, Bismarck and State Socialism: An Exposition of the Social and Economic Legislation of Germany since 1870 (London: Swan Sonnenschein & Co., 1891), p. 27
1840s
He undertook to be the protector of the poor, and this principle has been followed by our later kings. At their throne suffering has always found a refuge and a hearing. ... Our kings have secured the emancipation of the serfs, they have created a thriving peasantry, and they may possibly be successful—the earnest endeavour exists, at any rate—in improving the condition of the working classes somewhat. To have refused access to the throne to the complaints of these operatives would not have been the right course to pursue, and it was, moreover, not my business to do it. The question would afterwards have been asked: “How rich must a deputation be in order to its reception by the King?”
Speech to the Prussian United Diet in answer to the petition of Wüstegiersdorf weavers (1865), quoted in W. H. Dawson, Bismarck and State Socialism: An Exposition of the Social and Economic Legislation of Germany since 1870 (London: Swan Sonnenschein & Co., 1891), p. 31
1860s
Source: Speech to the Reichstag advocating protective tariffs, quoted in Paul Kennedy, The Rise of the Anglo-German Antagonism, 1860–1914 (1980), p. 51
“Every state must be aware that its peace, its security rests on its own sword.”
All the King's Men' A search for the colonial ideas of some advisers and "accomplices" of Leopold II (1853-1892). (Hannes Vanhauwaert), 5. A prospectus by the military Chazal and Brialmont, The military centipede Henri-Alexis Brialmont (1821-1893) http://www.ethesis.net/leopold_II/leopold_II.htm#2.%20 CROKAERT, P. Brialmont, 183.
Undated
