Franco Prussian War Quotes

“You speak of my popularity, but it is out of the question now, and in doing so, my dear Prime Minister, I declare that I will not doubt between my duty and my love: a popularity based on deceiving a country about its true interests would weigh heavily on my conscience and that is a burden that I do not want to bear.”
― Leopold II

“Not caring for their lives, is it? Why, what in the world should we care for if it's not our lives, the only gift the Lord never offers us a second time? Alas, dear God! You're right all the same, they don't care! I can remember them in '70, in those wretched wars, they've no fear of death left in them(...)they're not men anymore, they're lions.”
― Marcel Proust, C.K. Scott Moncrieff (Translator)

“It is not the first time that Belgium has had to undergo a dangerous ordeal. But never has the situation been more serious than today! … Freedom, honor, the very existence of the fatherland is at stake.”
― Leopold II

“In 1870, the throne was offered to Prince Leopold of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen. Had the Prince rejected the offer at once, there might have been no Franco-Prussian war, and Napoleon III might have ended his days still on the throne. Alas, he accepted. France was appalled, how possibly could she accept being the sausage the middle of a German sandwich.”
― John Julius Norwich, France: A History: from Gaul to de Gaulle