The Godfather (The Godfather #1)

by Mario Puzo

Don Corleone received everyone—rich and poor, powerful and humble—with an equal show of love. He slighted no one. That was his character.

He had long ago learned that society imposes insults that must be borne, comforted by the knowledge that in this world there comes a time when the most humble of men, if he keeps his eyes open, can take his revenge on the most powerful. It was this knowledge that prevented the Don from losing the humility all his friends admired in him.

The Don always taught that when a man was generous, he must show the generosity as personal.

It’s good you wish to be a father to your children. A man who is not a father to his children can never be a real man.

You let women dictate your actions and they are not competent in this world, though certainly they will be saints in heaven while we men burn in hell.

“Friendship is everything. Friendship is more than talent. It is more than government. It is almost the equal of family. Never forget that. If you had built up a wall of friendships you wouldn’t have to ask me to help.

Only a Sicilian born to the ways of omerta, the law of silence, could be trusted in the key post of Consigliere. Between the head of the Family, Don Corleone, who dictated policy, and the operating level of men who actually carried out the orders of the Don, there were three layers, or buffers. In that way nothing could be traced to the top. Unless the Consigliere turned traitor.

Hagen had learned the art of negotiation from the Don himself. “Never get angry,” the Don had instructed. “Never make a threat. Reason with people.” The word “reason” sounded so much better in Italian, ragione, to rejoin. The art of this was to ignore all insults, all threats; to turn the other cheek. Hagen had seen the Don sit at a negotiating table for eight hours, swallowing insults, trying to persuade a notorious and megalomaniac strong-arm man to mend his ways.