| The Columbia World of Quotations. 1996. |
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| NUMBER: | 41232 |
| QUOTATION: | There is only one step from the sublime to the ridiculous. |
| ATTRIBUTION: | Napoleon Bonaparte (1769–1821), French general, emperor. remark, Dec. 1812, to Polish Ambassador Abbé De Pradt. Quoted in Histoire de l’Ambassade dans le Grand-duché de Varsovie en 1812, p. 215, D.G. De Pradt (1815).
of Napoleon’s return by sledge to Paris after the failure of his Russian campaign; also in Comte de Las Cases’ Mémorial de Sainte-Hélène. Tom Paine had earlier observed (The Age of Reason, pt. 2, 1795): “One step above the sublime, makes the ridiculous; and one step above the ridiculous, makes the sublime again.” |
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| | | The Columbia World of Quotations. Copyright © 1996 Columbia University Press. |
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