
Balzac (or Tom Friedman from the New York Times?)
En francais: Le secret des grandes fortunes sans cause apparente est un crime oublié, parce qu’il a été proprement fait.
–Balzac in “Le Père Goriot” (1834)
In English: The secret of a great fortune made without apparent cause is soon forgotten, if the crime is committed in a respectable way.
Popular translation: Behind every great fortune is a great theft.
Honoré de Balzac (May 20, 1799 – August 18, 1850 was a French novelist and playwright. The novel sequence La Comédie Humaine, which presents a panorama of post-Napoleonic French life, is generally viewed as his magnum opus. Wikipedia