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.

I cannot prevent the French from being French

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

History does not teach fatalism. There are moments when the will of a handful of free men breaks through determinism and opens up new roads.

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

I might have had trouble saving France in 1946 - I didn't have television then.

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.