Notes from Wikiquote
Montesquieu:….I should first of all like to know from whom you will ask so much capital, and for what reason you will ask it. | Machiavelli: For that, foreign wars are a great help. In the great states, they permit the borrowing of five or six hundred millions; one manages so as to spend only half or two-thirds, and the rest finds its place in the treasury for domestic expenditures.