“If the art of war were nothing but the art of avoiding risks, glory would become the prey of mediocre minds…. I have made all the calculations; fate will do the rest.”

— Napoleon I of France

Statement at the beginning of the 1813 campaign, as quoted in The Mind of Napoleon (1955) by J. Christopher Herold, p. 45

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Napoleon I of France 259

French general, First Consul and later Emperor of the French 1769–1821

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“I am leaving in order to have peace and quiet, to be rid of the influence of civilization. I want only to do simple, very simple art, and to be able to do that, I have to immerse myself in virgin nature, see no one but savages, live their life, with no other thought in mind but to render, the way a child would, the concepts formed in my brain and to do this with the aid of nothing but the primitive means of art, the only means that are good and true.”

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“If the art of war were nothing but the art of avoiding risks, glory would become the prey of mediocre minds…. I have made all the calculations; fate will do the rest.”

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Napoleon I of France 259

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