“What I have done up to this is nothing. I am only at the beginning of the course I must run.”
Napoleon I of France (1769–1821) French general, First Consul and later Emperor of the French
As quoted in Memoirs of Count Miot de Melito (1788 - 1815) as translated by Frances Cashel Hoey and John Lillie (1881), Vol. II, p. 94
Context: What I have done up to this is nothing. I am only at the beginning of the course I must run. Do you imagine that I triumph in Italy in order to aggrandise the pack of lawyers who form the Directory, and men like Carnot and Barras? What an idea!