How, my dear, my incomparable Sister, how could I repress feelings of vengeance and of resentment against all my neighbors, of whom there is not one who did not accelerate my downfall, and will not, share in our spoils?
How can a Prince survive his State, the glory of his Country, his own reputation?
A Bavarian Elector, in his nonage [Son of the late poor Kaiser, and left, shipwrecked in his seventeenth year], or rather in a sort of subjection to his Ministers, and dull to the biddings of honor, may give himself up as a slave to the imperious domination of the House of Austria, and kiss the hand which oppressed his Father: I pardon it to his youth and his ineptitude.

But is that the example for me to follow?
No, dear Sister, you think too nobly to give me such mean (LACHE) advice.

Is Liberty, that precious prerogative, to be less dear to a Sovereign in the eighteenth century than it was to Roman Patricians of old?
And where is it said, that Brutus and Cato should carry magnanimity farther than Princes and Kings?
Firmness consists in resisting misfortune: but only cowards submit to the yoke, bear patiently their chains, and support oppression tranquilly.

Never, my dear Sister, could I resolve upon such ignominy....
"If I had followed only my own inclinations, I should have ended it (JE ME SERAIS DEPECHE) at once, after that unfortunate Battle which I lost.
But I felt that this would be weakness, and that it behooved me to repair the evil which had happened.

My attachment to the State awoke; I said to myself, It is not in seasons of prosperity that it is rare to find defenders, but in adversity.