“Hence it comes about that all armed Prophets have been victorious, and all unarmed Prophets have been destroyed.”

Men rise from one ambition to another: first, they seek to secure themselves against attack, and then they attack others.

When you disarm the people, you commence to offend them and show that you distrust them either through cowardice or lack of confidence, and both of these opinions generate hatred.

War is just when it is necessary; arms are permissible when there is no hope except in arms.

The one who adapts his policy to the times prospers, and likewise that the one whose policy clashes with the demands of the times does not.

The fact is that a man who wants to act virtuously in every way necessarily comes to grief among so many who are not virtuous.

A return to first principles in a republic is sometimes caused by the simple virtues of one man.

Nature that framed us of four elements, warring within our breasts for regiment, doth teach us all to have aspiring minds.

Men are so simple and so much inclined to obey immediate needs that a deceiver will never lack victims for his deceptions.

But when they lack the ability to do so and yet want to acquire more at all costs, they deserve condemnation for their mistakes.

It is better to be feared than loved, if you cannot be both.

Never was anything great achieved without danger.

There is nothing more difficult to take in hand, more perilous to conduct, or more uncertain in its success, than to take the lead in the introduction of a new order of things.

It is not titles that honor men, but men that honor titles.

A wise ruler ought never to keep faith when by doing so it would be against his interests.

The new ruler must determine all the injuries that he will need to inflict. He must inflict them once and for all.

We cannot attribute to fortune or virtue that which is achieved without either.

Before all else, be armed.

War is just when it is necessary; arms are permissible when there is no hope except in arms.

What a dog I got, his favorite bone is in my arm.

How many more children have to die before this country realizes that No Gun Zones create perfect locations for violence?

You can not stop criminals and mad men with laws, you can only stop violence with the fear of armed victims.

A sweaty Macbeth with blood on his arms coming in fresh from the battle doesn’t interest me.

I fling myself down on my back, throw my arms and legs out so that I look like an asterisk, and gaze at the sky.

I once recommended [in a San Francisco Chronicle column] that a third arm – a plastic arm – be sewn at the base of the spine so that people could have a tripod to sit on while waiting in line, and it was taken seriously.