A NEW ANALYTICAL COMPEND OF THE PRINCIPAL COMBINATIONS OF STRATEGY, OF GRAND TACTICS AND OF MILITARY POLICY

"The summary of the art of war, which 1 submit to the
public, was written originally for the instruction of an
august prince, and in view of the numerous additions
which I have just made to it, I flatter myself that it will be
worthy of its destination. To the end of causing its object to
be better appreciated, I believe it my duty to precede it by a
few lines upon the present state of the theory of war« I
shall be forced to speak a little of myself and my works; I
hope I shall be pardoned for it, for it would have been
difficult to explain what I think of this theory, and the part
which I may have had in it, without saying how I have
conceived it myself.
As I have said in my chapter of principles, published
by itself in 1807, the art of war has existed in all time, and
strategy especially was the same under Caesar as under
Napoleon. But the art, confined to the understanding of
great captains, existed in no written treatise. The books
all gave but fragments of systems, born of the imagination
of their authors, and containing ordinarily details the most
minute (not to say the most puerile), upon the most
accessory points of tactics, the only part of war, perhaps,
which it is possible to subject to fixed rules,"

-The Author