“Men have their virtues and their vices, their heroisms and their perversities; men are neither wholly good nor wholly bad, but possess and practice all that there is of good and bad here below. Such is the general rule. Temperament, education, the accidents of life, are modifying factors. Outside of this, everything is ordered arrangement, everything is chance. Such has been my rule of expectation and it has usually brought me success.”

—  Napoleon I of France

Napoleon : In His Own Words (1916)

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Napoleon I of France photo
Napoleon I of France 259
French general, First Consul and later Emperor of the French 1769–1821

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