Who is fit to be elected?' asked Napoleon. 'A Caesar, an Alexander only comes along once a century, so that election must be a matter of chance.

~ Simon Sebag Montefiore

Simon Sebag Montefiore Aristocracy Autocracy Chance Chronology Democracy Dynasty Election History Napoleon Politics Romantic Individual Russia

Power is always personal: any study of a Western democratic leader today reveals that, even in a transparent system with its short periods in office, personalities shape administrations. Democratic leaders often rule through trusted retainers instead of official ministers. In any court, power is as fluid as human personality.

~ Simon Sebag Montefiore

Simon Sebag Montefiore Aristocracy Autocracy Chronology Dynasty History Politics Russia

No empire lasts forever, no dynasty continues unbroken. Some day, you and I will be mere legends. All that matters is whether we did what we could with the life that was given to us.

~ Krishna Udayasankar

Krishna Udayasankar Dynasty Empire Ephemeral History Legacy Legends Life Life Well Lived Meaning Purpose

To the loyal and to the blood-lovers, in the good families and in the fiery dynasties, life is family and family is life. It is the same people who give advice and their vices to live well who turn out to be the ones who give resource and reason to live long.

~ Criss Jami

Criss Jami Advice Ancestors Aunt Blood Blood Is Thicker Than Water Bloodlines Brother Cousin Daughter Descendants Dignity Dynasty Faithfulness Family Father Fellowship Friendship Grandfather Grandmother Grandparents Holy Matrimony Honor Husband Life Living Living Well Long Life Love Loyalty Marriage Matrimony Meaning Meaning Of Life Mother Nobility Parents Purpose Purpose Of Life Reason Relationship Relatives Resources Royalty Sister Son Spouse Trust Uncle Vice Wealth Wife

The Constitution, the National Assembly, the dynastic parties, the blue and the red republicans, the heroes of Africa, the thunder from the platform, the sheet lightning of the daily press, the entire literature, the political names and the intellectual reputations, the civil law and penal code, the liberté, égalité, fraternité and the second of May 1852—all have vanished like a phantasmagoria before the spell of a man whom even his enemies do not make out to be a magician. Universal suffrage seems to have survived only for a moment, in order that with its own hand it may make its last will and testament before the eyes of all the world and declare in the name of the people itself: Everything that exists has this much worth, that it will perish.

~ Karl Marx

Karl Marx Authoritarian Authoritarianism Bourgeois Brumaire Cipolla Constitution Coup D État Dictator Dictatorship Dynasty Fascism France French Republic Louis Bonaparte Magician Mario And The Magician Monarchy Mountebank Napoleon Press Republicans Revolution Socialism Spell Suffrage Third Republic

A new dynasty is never founded without a struggle. Blood makes good manure. It will be a good thing for the Rougon family to be founded on a massacre, like many illustrious families.--Monsieur de Carnavant

~ Émile Zola

Émile Zola Dynasty Revolution

She feels Brutal Dynasty actually may become the Great American Novel she and her fellow critics have been looking for so long.

~ Clyde Brion Davis

Clyde Brion Davis Dynasty Gan Irony

Idealistic? Ruddy stupid, if you'll pardon the language, miss,: Mr Roberts said. All this talk about power for the people and down with the ruling classes and everyone should govern themselves. It can never happen, I told him. The ruling classes are born to rule. They know how to do it. You take a person like you or me and you put us up there to run a country and we'd make a ruddy mess of it.

~ Rhys Bowen

Rhys Bowen Communism Democratic Socialism Dynasty England Interesting Royalty Society Problem Trump Administration