Peace treaties signed by the vanquished are not freely signed. Men sign with a knife at their throat, they sign in spite of themselves, in order to avoid still greater losses; they sign as men surrender their purse when it is a case of your money or your life.
Les traités de paix ne couvrent rien, lorsque vous êtes le plus fort, & que vous réduisez vos voisins à signer le traité pour éviter de plus grands maux: alors il signe comme un particulier donne sa bourse à un voleur qui lui tient le pistolet sur la gorge.
Original text (French)
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Source, in full
Directions pour la conscience d'un roi (Paris: Estienne, 1775) p. 60; translation by A. Lentin, cited from Margaret Lucille Kekewich (ed.) Princes and Peoples: France and the British Isles, 1620-1714 (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1994) p. 226. (c. 1694).