Napoleon's Cigar | Rabbi Yosef Palacci

One of the most famous stories of Napoleon was the time where he told one of his top generals to go conquer this whole region. And all of a sudden he says, ‘And you see this one? ‘That one also.’ He says, ‘But -’ He tells him, ‘Napoleon, my dear King, this is so far out. ‘Like, what are you thinking?’ He says, ‘They have good cigars. Over there, the tobacco, I make an amazing cigar, Wahhh! You can’t imagine. So okay, great. He went ahead, this general. Literally conquered the whole region. And now he goes completely to the side, meaning, miles out, and he goes to conquer this town, with all the best tobacco out there and finally he conquers it. He’s so excited. He's meeting Napoleon the next day and he wraps up for Napoleon a nice fat cigar. And he can't wait to give it to him. He goes to Napoleon, and all he has the whole entourage, the whole army is coming in. The general’s walking to Napoleon and greeting him. He says, ‘My dear King, ‘I got you such a nice gift from that region.’ And he pulls out the fat cigar and he puts it in Napoleon's mouth, and he's about to light it. And before he lights it, Napoleon takes the cigar out of his mouth and in front of everybody, in front of all the soldiers and the army, they just went out to war with who knows what. He cracks the cigar in front of everybody and the general's jaw drops. ‘What are you doing?’ He says, ‘Let me tell you, everybody. Napoleon controls the cigar. The cigar doesn't control Napoleon.’ And he cracked in front of everybody to show he's in control, because that's a man. Same thing. You know, we have emotions, and therefore, one of the emotions is the eyes. And we got to think ?איזהו גיבור Who's a strong man? .הכובש את יצרו The one who conquers. The Yetzer Hara doesn't control me. I control it. My eyes are in my control.