It's not because I am proud, gentlemen, that I refuse your generous offer. But the state of our public finances forbids you to be so free with your money. The public good always comes before private interest.

Remarks at the Congress of Orezza opposing the National Assembly's proposal to provide Paoli with an annual pension of 50,000 francs (9 September 1790), quoted in Peter Adam Thrasher, Pasquale Paoli: An Enlightened Hero, 1725–1807 (1970), pp. 216-217