WIST

It is at night that faith in light is admirable.

Edmond Rostand (1868-1918) French playwright
Chantecler (1910)

To joke in the face of danger is the supreme politeness, a delicate refusal to cast oneself as a tragic hero.

Edmond Rostand (1868-1918) French playwright
Speech to the Académie française (1903)
Quoted in John Lahr, "Fighting and Writing," The New Yorker (12 Nov 2007).