Once upon a time there was an old country, wrapped up in habit and caution. We have to transform our old France into a new country and marry it to its time.

Greatness is a road leading towards the unknown.

I grew up to always respect authority and respect those in charge.

Nothing great will ever be achieved without great men, and men are great only if they are determined to be so.

The graveyards are full of indispensable men.

Patriotism is when love of your own people comes first; nationalism, when hate for people other than your own comes first.

I respect only those who resist me, but I cannot tolerate them.

France has lost the battle but she has not lost the war.

In the tumult of men and events, solitude was my temptation; now it is my friend. What other satisfaction can be sought once you have confronted History?

One does not arrest Voltaire.

A true leader always keeps an element of surprise up his sleeve, which others cannot grasp but which keeps his public excited and breathless.

Treaties, you see, are like girls and roses; they last while they last.

I might have had trouble saving France in 1946 – I didn’t have television then.

Only peril can bring the French together. One can’t impose unity out of the blue on a country that has 265 different kinds of cheese.

How can anyone govern a nation that has two hundred and forty-six different kinds of cheese?

Faced with crisis, the man of character falls back on himself. He imposes his own stamp of action, takes responsibility for it, makes it his own.

The leader must aim high, see big, judge widely, thus setting himself apart form the ordinary people who debate in narrow confines.

I have tried to lift France out of the mud. But she will return to her errors and vomitings. I cannot prevent the French from being French.

We are not here to laugh.

The sword is the axis of the world and its power is absolute.

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

It is not tolerable, it is not possible, that from so much death, so much sacrifice and ruin, so much heroism, a greater and better humanity shall not emerge.

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

Never relinquish the initiative.

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

When I am right, I get angry. Churchill gets angry when he is wrong. We are angry at each other much of the time.

When I want to know what France thinks, I ask myself.

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

Treaties are like roses and young girls. They last while they last.

China is a big country, inhabited by many Chinese.

I have against me the bourgeois, the military and the diplomats, and for me, only the people who take the Metro.

Old age is a shipwreck.

You may be sure that the Americans will commit all the stupidities they can think of, plus some that are beyond imagination.

France cannot be France without greatness.

Deliberation is the work of many men. Action, of one alone.

No country without an atom bomb could properly consider itself independent.

One cannot govern with ‘buts’.

The true statesman is the one who is willing to take risks.

Hearing Mass is the ceremony I most favor during my travels. Church is the only place where someone speaks to me and I do not have to answer back.

The better I get to know men, the more I find myself loving dogs.

I was France.

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

Silence is the ultimate weapon of power.

Don’t ask me who’s influenced me. A lion is made up of the lambs he’s digested, and I’ve been reading all my life.

In politics it is necessary either to betray one’s country or the electorate. I prefer to betray the electorate.

The great leaders have always stage-managed their effects.

In order to become the master, the politician poses as the servant.

Church is the only place where someone speaks to me and I do not have to answer back.

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

You’ll live. Only the best get killed.

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

No nation has friends only interests.

Authority doesn’t work without prestige, or prestige without distance.

Once upon a time there was an old country, wrapped up in habit and caution. We have to transform our old France into a new country and marry it to its time.

To govern is always to choose among disadvantages.

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

Since a politician never believes what he says, he is quite surprised to be taken at his word.

Politics is too serious a matter to be left to the politicians.

As an adolescent I was convinced that France would have to go through gigantic trials, that the interest of life consisted in one day rendering her some signal service and that I would have the occasion to do so.