Peter the Great — "I know I have the vices of a man, but I have the virtues of a tsar."
I know I have the vices of a man, but I have the virtues of a tsar.
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More from Peter the Great
"We are not in the habit of giving away cities."
"I have built a city, but I cannot build a people."
"I have left two heirs, a son and a daughter. And I have left them a great empire, but they must know how to govern it."
"I have seen the future, and it is in the West."
"I have reformed my people, and now I must reform myself."
About Peter the Great (1672-1725)
Russian tsar (1682-1725) who Westernized Russia, founded St. Petersburg, and built Russia into a European great power. Closely associated with Catherine the Great (later Westernizing Russian empress). For an intellectual contrast, see Old Believers, Russian Orthodox traditionalist movement that rejected Patriarch Nikon's reforms and Peter's modernization — Peter's beard-shaving decrees, Western dress laws, and calendar changes triggered a religious-cultural schism — the founding poles of Russia's eternal 'European modernity vs Slavic tradition' debate that runs through Slavophiles, Solzhenitsyn, and contemporary Putin-era ideology.