Using a variable with LIMIT in SELECT statement

[CMS]

Is it possible, either directly or with a decent workaround to perform a LIMIT on a SELECT statement using a variable?

For example, I want the top N results, where N might be passed in to a stored procedure, or even issued from the command line...

CREATE PROCEDURE `xx`(IN N INT)
SELECT * FROM `Candidate` LIMIT N;

This fails at 'LIMIT N' because, apparently, LIMIT has to be followed by a literal constant.

Is there a way to do this, or do I need to construct the SQL in my client and give up on using a stored procedure whenever I need a variable number of results?

Thanks!
-Cj