To hope for safety in flight, when you have turned away from the enemy the arms by which the body is defended, is indeed madness. In battle those who are most afraid are always in most danger; but courage is equivalent to rampart.
But assuredly Fortune rules in all things; she raised to eminence or buries in oblivion everything from caprice rather than from well-regulated principle.
Neither the army nor the treasury, but friends, are the true supports of the throne; for friends cannot be collected by force of arms, nor purchased with money; they are the offspring of kindness and sincerity.
