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What then is, generally speaking, the [[truth of history? A fable agreed upon.
--
Conversation with Emmanuel, comte de Las Cases (20 November 1816), Mémorial de Sainte Hél?ne, v. 4, p. 251. However, the phrase predates Napoleon. Helvétius attributes it to Bernard le Bovier de Fontenelle, De l'esprit (1758), p. 443

 

Napoleon Bonaparte

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When I discovered that history is a fable, and a poor one at that, I started looking for a better fable, and found theology.

 

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An untruth must be spoken, where need requires. For whether men lie, or say true, it is with one and the same object. Men lie, because they think to gain by deceiving others; and speak the truth, because they expect to get something by their true speaking, and to be trusted afterwards in more important matters. Thus, though their conduct is so opposite, the end of both is alike. If there were no gain to be got, your true-speaking man would tell untruths as much as your liar, and your liar would tell the truth as much as your true-speaking man.

 

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Such fable ours! However sweet,
That earlier hope had, if fulfilled,
Been but child's pap and toothless meat
— And meaning blunt and deed unwilled,
And we but motes that dance in light
And in such light gleam like the core
Of light, but lightless, are in right
Blind dust that fouls the unswept floor

For, no: not faith by fable lives,
But from the faith the fable springs
— It never is the song that gives
Tongue life, it is the tongue that sings;
And sings the song. Then, let the act
Speak, it is the unbetrayable
Command, if music, let the fact
Make music's motion; us, the fable

 

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Jean Piaget