Antoine de Saint-Exupery's Quotes

He who has gone, so we but cherish his memory, abides with us, more potent, nay, more present than the living man.

Each man must look to himself to teach him the meaning of life. It is not something discovered: it is something molded.

To be a man is, precisely, to be responsible.

Perfection is achieved, not when there is nothing more to add, but when there is nothing left to take away.

The one thing that matters is the effort.

The notion of looking on at life has always been hateful to me. What am I if I am not a participant? In order to be, I must participate.

A civilization is a heritage of beliefs, customs, and knowledge slowly accumulated in the course of centuries, elements difficult at times to justify by logic, but justifying themselves as paths when they lead somewhere, since they open up for man his inner distance.

Perfection is finally attained not when there is no longer anything to add but when there is no longer anything to take away, when a body has been stripped down to its nakedness.

Of what worth are convictions that bring not suffering?

A civilization is built on what is required of men, not on that which is provided for them.

Once men are caught up in an event, they cease to be afraid. Only the unknown frightens men.

One can be a brother only in something. Where there is no tie that binds men, men are not united but merely lined up.

Only the unknown frightens men. But once a man has faced the unknown, that terror becomes the known.

The machine does not isolate man from the great problems of nature but plunges him more deeply into them.

Whoever loves above all the approach of love will never know the joy of attaining it.

Only he can understand what a farm is, what a country is, who shall have sacrificed part of himself to his farm or country, fought to save it, struggled to make it beautiful. Only then will the love of farm or country fill his heart.

The aeroplane has unveiled for us the true face of the earth.

War is not an adventure. It is a disease. It is like typhus.

You become responsible, forever, for what you have tamed.

How could there be any question of acquiring or possessing, when the one thing needful for a man is to become - to be at last, and to die in the fullness of his being.

Transport of the mails, transport of the human voice, transport of flickering pictures-in this century as in others our highest accomplishments still have the single aim of bringing men together.

We say nothing essential about the cathedral when we speak of its stones. We say nothing essential about Man when we seek to define him by the qualities of men.

True happiness comes from the joy of deeds well done, the zest of creating things new.

Love does not consist in gazing at each other, but in looking outward together in the same direction.

If you want to build a ship, don't drum up people to collect wood and don't assign them tasks and work, but rather teach them to long for the endless immensity of the sea.

And now here is my secret, a very simple secret; it is only with the heart that one can see rightly, what is essential is invisible to the eye.