Quotes about power

All powers have two sides, the power to create and the power to destroy. We must recognize them both, but invest our gifts on the side of creation.

But it is no use to justify yourself. It is no good to explain. It is weak to be anecdotal. It is wise to conceal the past even if there is nothing to conceal. A man’s power is in the half-light, in the half-seen movements of his hand and the unguessed-at expression of his face. It is the absence of facts that frightens people: the gap you open, into which they pour their fears, fantasies, desires.

A part of the art of ruling, I suppose, is to know when to shut your ears.

At the gate was a large, heavy-set man, who was eyeing the queue with the smug look of minor power-wielders everywhere. (p. 46)

It's a fact as immutable as the Third Law of Sod that there is no such thing as a good Grand Vizier. A predilection to cackle and plot is apparently part of the job spec.

"When I was about three years old... I realised that words could move the power in a room."

“Size, power, numbers—since the beginning of time, those three have been trying to correlate with right and wrong. So far, they haven’t succeeded.”

Nodding, the Ambassador murmured, “Very true. But, on the other hand, they do exceedingly well with life and death.”

Another war is always coming, Robert. They are never properly extinguished. What sparks war? The will to power, the backbone of human nature. The threat of violence, the fear of violence, or actual violence, is the instrument of this dreadful will… The nation state is merely human nature inflated to monstrous proportions. QES, nations are entities whose laws are written by violence. Thus it ever was, so ever shall it be.

You must surely know by now, Winters, that a leader’s authority is limited to giving her followers orders that they will actually obey.

You can’t trust people in power, dearie. They’ll say whatever they want, all the witnesses will be paid to agree, and then you’re behind bars till the end of your days. Or worse.

“All power corrupts but some must govern and in that case Brother Lacon will reluctantly scramble to the top of the heap.”

A Revolution is nothing other than the replacement of one given type of Authority with another.