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About this quote

What does it mean?
Leaders wield great influence over events but lack peace and personal freedom.
In plain terms
Princes change the times but live with constant attention and no rest.
What can you take from it?
Power brings influence but costs personal peace.

Where it applies

  • management
  • public life
  • politics

Putting it to work

  • seek balance
  • expect costs of power
  • protect private time

Questions to consider

  • Is fame worth the cost?
  • How do leaders rest?

Another view

Some leaders find rest through delegation.

More from Francis Bacon

  1. Travel, in the younger sort, is a part of education; in the elder, a part of experience. He that traveleth into a country before he hath some entrance into the…

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  2. The greatest trust, between man and man, is the trust of giving counsel. For in other confidences, men commit the parts of life; their lands, their goods, thei…

    Permalink to quote #100
  3. It were better to have no opinion of God at all, than such an opinion, as is unworthy of him. For the one is unbelief, the other is contumely; and certainly su…

    Permalink to quote #97

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