Charles de Gaulle Quotes

Il n'y a pas de politique qui vaille en dehors des réalités.

Pourquoi voulez-vous qu'à 67 ans je commence une carrière de dictateur ?

La France a perdu une bataille, mais la France n'a pas perdu la guerre.

When we were children, we often played war. We had a fine collection of lead soldiers. My brothers would take different countries: Xavier had Italy; Pierre, Germany. Or they would swap around. Well, I, gentlemen, always had France.

Le désir du privilège et le goût de l'égalité, passions dominantes et contradictoires des Français de toute époque.

La France ne peut être la France sans la grandeur.

Treaties are like maidens and roses. They each have their day.

England in effect is insular, she is maritime, she is linked through her exchanges, her markets, her supply lines to the most diverse and often the most distant countries; she pursues essentially industrial and commercial activities, and only slight agricultural ones. She has in all her doings very marked and very original habits and traditions. In short, the nature, the structure, the very situation that are England's differ profoundly from those of the continentals.

On ne fait rien de grand sans de grands hommes, et ceux-ci le sont pour l'avoir voulu.

L'épée est l'axe du monde et la grandeur ne se divise pas.

I must say that if, on resuming control of our affairs, I embraced the Common Market forthwith, it was as much because of our position as an agricultural country as for the spur it would give to our industry.

The leader is always alone before bad fates.

No policy is worth anything outside of reality.

Let us be firm, pure and faithful; at the end of our sorrow, there is the greatest glory of the world, that of the men who did not give in.

La France fut faite à coups d'épée. La fleur de lys, symbole d'unité nationale, n'est que l'image d'un javelot à trois lances.