Peter the Great — "I shall make Russia great, even if I have to hang half of it."
I shall make Russia great, even if I have to hang half of it.
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More from Peter the Great
"Alas! I have civilized my own subjects; I have conquered other nations; yet I have not been able to civilize or to conquer myself."
"Why do you come to me? Go to the Senate; they make the laws."
"When you have to deal with a bear, you have to kill it or let it run away. You cannot just cut off its paws and expect it to be harmless."
"I have no doubt that if I had not been born a king, I would have become a craftsman."
"I have a mind that is always looking for new things."
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.