To hold power has always meant to manipulate idiots and circumstances; and those circumstances and those idiots, tossed together, bring about those coincidences to which even the greatest men confess they owe most of their fame

In his later years he spent much time preparing the posthumous collection of poems now known as Les Destinées (though Vigny's intended title was Poèmes philosophiques) which concludes with Vigny's final message to the world L'Esprit pur. He collected his recent works in January 1826 in Poèmes antiques et modernes. ') Vigny died in Paris on 17 September 1863 a few months after the passing of his wife and is buried beside her in the Cimetière de Montmartre in Paris France.