“I wouldn’t mind dying for France, but not for Air France.”

There can be no prestige without mystery, for familiarity breeds contempt.

You have to be fast on your feet and adaptive or else a strategy is useless.

One must wait until the evening to see how splendid the day was; one cannot judge life until death.

For glory gives herself only to those who have always dreamed of her.

Belgium is a country invented by the British to annoy the French.

I have heard your views. They do not harmonize with mine. The decision is taken unanimously.

I’m not at all embarrassed to be a revolutionary.

The graveyards are full of indispensable men.

You start out giving your hat, then you give your coat, then your shirt, then your skin and finally your soul.

We may go to the moon, but that’ s not very far. The greatest distance we have to cover still lies within us.

A great country worthy of the name does not have any friends.

To govern is always to choose among disadvantages.

Diplomats are useful only in fair weather. As soon as it rains they drown in every drop.

A man of character finds a special attractiveness in difficulty, since it is only by coming to grips with difficulty that he can realize his potentialities.

I have come to the conclusion that politics are too serious a matter to be left to the politicians.

Greatness is a road leading towards the unknown.

I’ve learned that regardless of your relationship with your parents, you’ll miss them when they’re gone from your life.

It is not death that a man should fear, but he should fear never beginning to live.

Death smiles at us all; all we can do is smile back.

Death is something inevitable. When a man has done what he considers to be his duty to his people and his country, he can rest in peace.

I postpone death by living, by suffering, by error, by risking, by giving, by losing.

Ugliness is better than beauty. It lasts longer and in the end, gravity will get us all.

I’ll starve to death before I’ll cook for myself. I think I could survive a week without eating.

I do not fear death. I had been dead for billions and billions of years before I was born, and had not suffered the slightest inconvenience from it.