“I have no ambition to govern men; it is a painful and thankless office.”

No. 43
Characteristics, in the manner of Rochefoucauld's Maxims (1823)

Review of The Life of Napoleon Bonaparte (1827) by Sir Walter Scott, in the Christian Examiner (September - October 1827)

As quoted in Charting the Candidates '72 (1972) by Ronald Van Doren, p. 7
1940s–present
Context: The state — or, to make the matter more concrete, the government — consists of a gang of men exactly like you and me. They have, taking one with another, no special talent for the business of government; they have only a talent for getting and holding office. Their principal device to that end is to search out groups who pant and pine for something they can't get and to promise to give it to them. Nine times out of ten that promise is worth nothing. The tenth time is made good by looting A to satisfy B. In other words, government is a broker in pillage, and every election is sort of an advance auction sale of stolen goods.

The Absolute at Large (1921)

Source: The Importance of Living (1937), p. 20

Le sage guérit de l'ambition par l'ambition même; il tend à de si grandes choses, qu'il ne peut se borner à ce qu'on appelle des trésors, des postes, la fortune et la faveur.
Aphorism 43
Les Caractères (1688), Du mérite personnel

Je ne trouve rien de si pénible que d'avoir à mener des hommes.
in his December 29 1816 letter to his uncle Léonor Mérimée, in [Œuvres complètes d'Augustin Fresnel, Imprimerie impériale, 1866, http://books.google.com/books?id=3QgAAAAAMAAJ, xviii]

Hansard, HC Dec 21 May 1946 vol 423 c64W

Herbert N. Casson cited in: Supervisory Management. Vol. 1 (1955). p. 60
1950s and later