“To accomplish great things we must live as though we had never to die.”

—  Luc de Clapiers, Marquis de Vauvenargues

Pour exécuter de grandes choses, il faut vivre comme si on ne devait jamais mourir.
Quoted in Queers in History: The Comprehensive Encyclopedia of Historical Gays (2009), by Keith Stern, p. 466.
Variant: In order to achieve great things, we must live as though we were never going to die.
Source: Reflections and Maxims (1746), p. 172.

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Luc de Clapiers, Marquis de Vauvenargues photo
Luc de Clapiers, Marquis de Vauvenargues60
French writer, a moralist 1715–1747

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