"Honesty is the best policy, says the familiar axiom; but people who are honest on that principle defraud no one but themselves."

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I am asked if I would not be gratified if my friends would procure me promotion to a brigadier-generalship. My feeling is that I would rather be one of the good colonels than one of the poor generals. The colonel of a regiment has one of the most agreeable positions in the service, and one of the most useful. "A good colonel makes a good regiment," is an axiom.

— Rutherford B. Hayes