Quotes & Sayings About Peter The Great Of Russia

To modernize their sleeping habits, [Peter the Great] declared, 'Ladies and gentlemen of the court caught sleeping with their boots on will be instantly decapitated. — Bob Massie

Since the days of Peter the Great, Russia had looked to the West for her civilization, even to the extend of adopting French as a second language - or as a first for people of station and learning. The United States, recently cut loose politically from England, still drew heavily on the Old World for her art, literature, science and philosophy. Intellectuals from both nations flocked to Europe in search of eduction and aesthetic stimulation, and many became so enthralled with European civilization that they failed to return. In Russia as well as in the United States many an indignant patriot would rant about the need for serving European apron strings. — Perry D. Westbrook

Vladimir Putin is a Russian czar. He's kind of a mix of Peter the Great and Stalin. He's got both in his veins. And he looks out first and foremost for the national security interests of Russia. He accepts that, in Eastern Europe, that is a Russian backyard, that is a Russian sphere of influence. Ukraine lives most uncomfortably and unhappily in a Russian backyard. — Marvin Kalb

Poseidon's trident was also all over the place, since Peter the Great wanted to stress Russia's sea power. I especially like the trident on top of an obelisk
what a great Egyptian/Greek mix up! — Rick Riordan

This formidable officine dates from Peter the Great, who formed it in 1697...its historic origins must, however, be looked for much earlier; one finds them in the byzantine traditions and in the operations of the Tartar domination...espionage, delation, torture, and secret executions were the normal and regulating instruments of the |||||||| police. — Maurice Paleologue

Successions are explained by historical narratives that indicate the significance of the events and the forces-human and otherwise-which influenced them. While some causal forces operate continuously, others influence the sequence of events only at particular points in time. For example, it makes no sense to say that Peter the Great caused the cold war; he had been dead for centuries before it started, and any direct causal influence would be impossible. However, Peter the Great took actions that set into motion historical events that promoted the unification and modernization of Russia. Without Peter, it is possible that Russia would have developed differently and that the cold war would not have occurred. Peter's actions exerted an influence in this case, but it is not the type of direct, continuous causal influence that most variable-based social science theories rely on. — Marshall Scott Poole

Slavophilism, the messianism of backwardness, has based its philosophy upon the assumption that the Russian people and their church are democratic through and through, whereas official Russia is a German bureaucracy imposed upon them by Peter the Great. — Leon Trotsky

Since Peter the Great, Russia had been expanding at the rate of one Belgium per year. — Henry Kissinger

Peter the Great was probably the equal, in dedication, power and ruthlessness, of many of the most successful revolutionary or nationalist leaders. Yet he failed in his chief purpose, which was to turn Russia into a Western nation. And the reason he failed was that he did not infuse the Russian masses with some soul-stirring enthusiasm. He either did not think it necessary or did not know how to make of his purpose a holy cause. It is not strange that the Bolshevik revolutionaries who wiped out the last of the Czars and Romanovs should have a sense of kinship with Peter - a Czar and a Romanov. For his purpose is now theirs, and they hope to succeed where he failed. The Bolshevik revolution may figure in history as much an attempt to modernize a sixth of the world's surface as an attempt to build a Communist economy. The — Eric Hoffer