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The absolute ruler may be a Nero, but he is sometimes a Titus or a Marcus Aurelius; the people is often Nero, but never Marcus Aurelius.

— Antoine de Rivarol

Le prince absolu peut être un Néron, mais il est quelquefois Titus ou Marc-Aurèle; le peuple est souvent Néron, et jamais Marc-Aurèl.

Original text (French)

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Notes from Wikiquote

Quoted by Erik von Kuehnelt-Leddihn in The Menace of the Herd (1943), p. 103

More quotes by Antoine de Rivarol

God is the highest measure of our incapacity; the universe, space itself, are not so inaccessible.

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The being that only feels does not yet think, and the being that thinks feels always.

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The man who speaks is the man who thinks out loud.

De l'universalité de la langue française (1784)

It is prose which gives sway to a language, because it is quite usual; poetry is only a luxury object.

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Certainty and mystery are for feeling; clarity and uncertainty for reasoning.

Of Man, His Intellectual Faculties, and His Main Ideas (1797)

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Attribution

Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Antoine de Rivarol (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.