Quotes by voltaire final

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Quotes

Voltaire

A witty saying proves nothing.

All men are born with a nose and five fingers, but no one is born with a

knowledge of God.

All styles are good except the tiresome kind.

All the reasonings of men are not worth one sentiment of women.

Anyone who seeks to destroy the passions instead of controlling them is

trying to play the angel.

Appreciation is a wonderful thing: It makes what is excellent in others

belong to us as well.

By appreciation, we make excellence in others our own property.

Chance is a word void of sense; nothing can exist without a cause.

Clever tyrants are never punished.

Common sense is not so common.

Divorce is probably of nearly the same date as marriage. I believe, however, that marriage is some weeks the more ancient.

Doubt is not a pleasant condition, but certainty is absurd.

Each player must accept the cards life deals him or her: but once they are in hand, he or she alone must

decide how to play the cards in order to win the game.

Every man is guilty of all the good he did not do.

Every one goes astray, but the least imprudent are they who repent the

soonest.

Everything's fine today, that is our illusion.

Faith consists in believing when it is beyond the power of reason to believe.

Fear follows crime and is its punishment.

Friendship is the marriage of the soul, and this marriage is liable to divorce.

Froth at the top, dregs at bottom, but the middle excellent.

God always gives His best to those who leave the choice with him. - Jim Elliot

God gave us the gift of life; it is up to us to give ourselves the gift of living

well.

God is not on the side of the big battalions, but on the side of those who

shoot best.

Governments need to have both shepherds and butchers.

He is a hard man who is only just, and a sad one who is only wise.

He must be very ignorant for he answers every question he is asked.

He shines in the second rank, who is eclipsed in the first.

He was a great patriot, a humanitarian, a loyal friend; provided, of course, he

really is dead.

He who has not the spirit of this age, has all the misery of it.

He who is not just is severe, he who is not wise is sad.

History is only the register of crimes and misfortunes.

History should be written as philosophy.

Hope is a waking dream. - Aristotle

I am very fond of truth, but not at all of martyrdom.

I die adoring God, loving my friends, not hating my enemies, and detesting

superstition.

I do not agree with what you have to say, but I'll defend to the death your

right to say it.

I have lived eighty years of life and know nothing for it, but to be resigned and tell myself that flies are

born to be eaten by spiders and man to be devoured by sorrow.

I have never made but one prayer to God, a very short one: 'O Lord make my enemies ridiculous.' And God granted it.

I know many books which have bored their readers, but I know of none which

has done real evil.

I should like to lie at your feet and die in your arms.

Ice-cream is exquisite - what a pity it isn't illegal.

If God created us in his own image, we have more than reciprocated.

If God did not exist, it would be necessary to invent Him.

Illusion is the first of all pleasures.

In every author let us distinguish the man from his works.

In general, the art of government consists of taking as much money as possible from

one class of citizens to give to another.

In the case of news, we should always wait for the sacrament of confirmation.

Indeed, history is nothing more than a tableau of crimes and misfortunes.

Independence, Injustice

Injustice in the end produces independence.

Is there anyone so wise as to learn by the experience of others?

It is better to risk saving a guilty man than to condemn an innocent one.

It is dangerous to be right in matters on which the established authorities are

wrong.

It is difficult to free fools from the chains they revere.

It is forbidden to kill; therefore all murderers are punished unless they kill in large numbers and

to the sound of trumpets.

It is lamentable, that to be a good patriot one must become the enemy of

the rest of mankind.

It is not enough to conquer; one must learn to seduce.

It is not known precisely where

angels dwell whether in the air, the void, or the planets. It has not been God's pleasure

that we should be informed of their

abode.

It is not love that should be depicted as blind, but self-love.

It is not sufficient to see and to know the beauty of a work. We must feel and

be affected by it.

It is one of the superstitions of the human mind to have imagined that

virginity could be a virtue.

It is said that the present is pregnant with the future.

It is the flash which appears, the thunderbolt will follow.

It is vain for the coward to flee; death follows close behind; it is only by defying

it that the brave escape.

It takes courage to grow up and become who you really are. - e. e.

cummings

It's never what you say, but how you make it sound sincere. - Marya Mannes

Let the punishments of criminals be useful.

A hanged man is good for nothing; a man condemned to

public works still serves the country,

and is a living lesson.

Let us read and let us dance - two amusements that will never do any

harm to the world.

Let us work without theorizing, tis the only way to make life endurable.

Life is thickly sown with thorns, and I know no other remedy than to pass quickly through them. The longer we

dwell on our misfortunes, the greater is their power to harm

us.

Love has features which pierce all hearts, he wears a bandage which conceals the faults of those beloved. He has wings, he comes quickly and flies away the

same.

Love is a canvas furnished by nature and embroidered by imagination.

Meditation is the dissolution of thoughts in Eternal awareness or

Pure consciousness without objectification,

knowing without thinking, merging finitude in infinity.

Men hate the individual whom they call avaricious only because nothing can be

gained from him.

Men use thought only as authority for their injustice, and employ speech only

to conceal their thoughts.

Nature has always had more force than education.

No problem can withstand the assault of sustained thinking.

Nothing would be more tiresome than eating and drinking if God had not made them a pleasure as well as a necessity.

Of all religions, the Christian should of course inspire the most tolerance, but until now Christians

have been the most intolerant of all men.

One great use of words is to hide our thoughts.

One merit of poetry few persons will deny: it says more and in fewer words

than prose.

Opinion has caused more trouble on this little earth than plagues or

earthquakes.

Optimism is the madness of insisting that all is well when we are miserable.

Originality is nothing but judicious imitation. The most original writers

borrowed one from another.

Our country is that spot to which our heart is bound.

Paradise was made for tender hearts; hell, for loveless hearts.

Perfection is attained by slow degrees; it requires the hand of time.

Religion was instituted to make us happy in this life and in the other. What must we do

to be happy in the life to come? Be just.

Satire lies about literary men while they live and eulogy lies about them when

they die.

Society therefore is an ancient as the world.

Such is the feebleness of humanity, such is its

perversity, that doubtless it is better for

it to be subject to all possible superstitions, as long as they are not murderous, than to live

without religion.

Superstition is to religion what astrology is to astronomy the mad daughter of a wise mother.

These daughters have too long dominated the earth.

Tears are the silent language of grief.

The ancient Romans built their greatest masterpieces of architecture, their

amphitheaters, for wild beasts to fight in.

The ancients recommended us to sacrifice to the Graces, but Milton

sacrificed to the Devil.

The art of medicine consists in amusing the patient while nature cures the

disease.

The best government is a benevolent tyranny tempered by an occasional

assassination.

The best is the enemy of the good.

The ear is the avenue to the heart.

The first step, my son, which one makes in the world, is the one on which

depends the rest of our days.

The flowery style is not unsuitable to public

speeches or addresses, which amount only to

compliment. The lighter beauties are in their place

when there is nothing more solid to say; but the flowery style ought to be banished from a pleading,

a sermon, or a didactic work.

The Holy Roman Empire is neither Holy, nor Roman, nor an Empire.

The husband who decides to surprise his wife is often very much surprised

himself.

The infinitely little have a pride infinitely great.

The instruction we find in books is like fire. We fetch it from our neighbours, kindle it at home,

communicate it to others, and it becomes the property of all.

The little may contrast with the great, in painting, but cannot be said to be

contrary to it. Oppositions of colors contrast; but there are also colors

contrary to each other, that is, which produce an

ill effect because they shock the eye when brought very near it.

The mouth obeys poorly when the heart murmurs.

The multitude of books is making us ignorant.

The opportunity for doing mischief is found a hundred times a day, and of

doing good once in a year.

The personal life deeply lived always expands into truths beyond itself. -

Anais Nin

The progress of rivers to the ocean is not so rapid as that of man to error.

The public is a ferocious beast; one must either chain it or flee from it.

The safest course is to do nothing against one's conscience. With this secret, we can

enjoy life and have no fear from death.

The secret of being a bore... is to tell everything.

The sovereign is called a tyrant who knows no laws but his caprice.

The superfluous, a very necessary thing.

The true triumph of reason is that it enables us to get along with those who

do not possess it.

The truths of religion are never so well understood as by those who have lost

the power of reason.

The world embarrasses me, and I cannot dream that this watch exists and has no

watchmaker.

There are truths which are not for all men, nor for all times.

Think for yourselves and let others enjoy the privilege to do so, too.

This self-love is the instrument of our preservation; it

resembles the provision for the perpetuity of

mankind: it is necessary, it is dear to us, it gives us pleasure, and we must conceal it.

Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit

atrocities.

Time, which alone makes the reputation of men, ends by making their defects

respectable.

To believe in God is impossible not to believe in Him is absurd.

To hold a pen is to be at war.

To succeed in the world it is not enough to be stupid, you must also be well-

mannered.

To the living we owe respect, but to the dead we owe only the truth.

To the wicked, everything serves as pretext.

Tyrants have always some slight shade of virtue; they support the laws before

destroying them.

Understand, Himself, Whom

Use, do not abuse... neither abstinence nor excess ever renders man happy.

Very learned women are to be found, in the same manner as female warriors; but they are seldom or ever inventors.

Very often, say what you will, a knave is only a fool.

We are all full of weakness and errors; let us mutually pardon each other our

follies - it is the first law of nature.

We are rarely proud when we are alone.

We cannot always oblige; but we can always speak obligingly.

We cannot wish for that we know not.

We have a natural right to make use of our pens as of our tongue, at our peril,

risk and hazard.

We must cultivate our own garden. When man was put in the garden of Eden he

was put there so that he should work,

which proves that man was not born to

rest.

We must distinguish between speaking to deceive and being silent to be

reserved.

We never live; we are always in the expectation of living.

Weakness on both sides is, as we know, the motto of all quarrels.

What a heavy burden is a name that has become too famous.

What is tolerance? It is the consequence of humanity. We are all formed of frailty and error; let us pardon reciprocally each

other's folly - that is the first law of

nature.

What most persons consider as virtue, after the age of 40 is simply a loss of

energy.

What then do you call your soul? What idea have you of it? You

cannot of yourselves, without revelation, admit the existence

within you of anything but a power unknown to

you of feeling and thinking.

When he to whom one speaks does not understand, and he who speaks himself

does not understand, that is metaphysics.

When it is a question of money, everybody is of the same religion.

When men do not have healthy notions of the Divinity, false ideas

supplant them, just as in bad times one uses

counterfeit money when there is no good money.

Where there are friends there is wealth. - Plautus

Wherever there is a settled society, religion is necessary; the laws cover manifest

crimes, and religion covers secret crimes.

Who serves his country well has no need of ancestors.

Woe to the makers of literal translations, who by rendering every word weaken the meaning! It is indeed by so doing that we can say the

letter kills and the spirit gives life.

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