Voltaire

Injustice in the end produces independence.

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

Governments need to have both shepherds and butchers.

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

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.

Nature has always had more force than education.

I have only ever made one prayer to God, a very short one: O Lord, make my enemies ridiculous. And God granted it.

As long as people believe in absurdities they will continue to commit atrocities.

Men use thought only as authority for their injustice, and employ speech only to conceal their thoughts.

Judge a man by his questions rather than his answers.

The true triumph of reason is that it enables us to get along with those who do not possess it.

Let us read and let us dance – two amusements that will never do any harm to the world.

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.

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.

Originality is nothing but judicious imitation. The most original writers borrowed one from another.

The opportunity for doing mischief is found a hundred times a day, and of doing good once in a year.

History is only the register of crimes and misfortunes.

He was a great patriot, a humanitarian, a loyal friend; provided, of course, he really is dead.

To the wicked, everything serves as pretext.

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

Man is free at the moment he wishes to be.

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

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

It is an infantile superstition of the human spirit that virginity would be thought a virtue and not the barrier that separates ignorance from knowledge.

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

A witty saying proves nothing.

Never argue at the dinner table, for the one who is not hungry always gets the best of the argument.

The ancient Romans built their greatest masterpieces of architecture, their amphitheaters, for wild beasts to fight in.

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

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.

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

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

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

History should be written as philosophy.

To hold a pen is to be at war.

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

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

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

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

The multitude of books is making us ignorant.

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

Anything that is too stupid to be spoken is sung.

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

Fear follows crime and is its punishment.

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.

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

Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities.

Meditation is the dissolution of thoughts in Eternal awareness or Pure consciousness without objectification, knowing without thinking, merging finitude in infinity.

The best government is a benevolent tyranny tempered by an occasional assassination.

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.

Better is the enemy of good.

Tears are the silent language of grief.

Whoever serves his country well has no need of ancestors.

Behind every successful man stands a surprised mother-in-law.

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.

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

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

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

The safest course is to do nothing against one’s conscience. With this secret, we can enjoy life and have no fear from death.

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

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

It is forbidden to kill; therefore all murderers are punished unless they kill in large numbers and to the sound of trumpets.

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

Everything’s fine today, that is our illusion.

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

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

God is a comedian, playing to an audience too afraid to laugh.

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

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

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

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.

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

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

The ancients recommended us to sacrifice to the Graces, but Milton sacrificed to the Devil.

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

The first step, my son, which one makes in the world, is the one on which depends the rest of our days.

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

How pleasant it is for a father to sit at his child’s board. It is like an aged man reclining under the shadow of an oak which he has planted.

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

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

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

I do not agree with what you have to say, but I’ll defend to the death your right to say it.

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

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

The very impossibility in which I find myself to prove that God is not, discovers to me his existence.

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

All styles are good except the tiresome kind.

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

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

Anyone who has the power to make you believe absurdities has the power to make you commit injustices.

Common sense is not so common.

The best way to be boring is to leave nothing out.

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

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

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.

If there were no God, it would be necessary to invent him.

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

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

The ideal form of government is democracy tempered with assassination.

We cannot wish for that we know not.

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

I hate women because they always know where things are.

The art of government is to make two-thirds of a nation pay all it possibly can pay for the benefit of the other third.

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

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

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

Appreciation is a wonderful thing: It makes what is excellent in others belong to us as well.

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

Business is the salt of life.

All murderers are punished unless they kill in large numbers and to the sound of trumpets.

The mouth obeys poorly when the heart murmurs.

No problem can withstand the assault of sustained thinking.

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.

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

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

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

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

No snowflake in an avalanche ever feels responsible.

The ear is the avenue to the heart.

My life is a struggle.

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

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

One great use of words is to hide our thoughts.

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

Anyone who seeks to destroy the passions instead of controlling them is trying to play the angel.

Of all religions, the Christian should of course inspire the most tolerance, but until now Christians have been the most intolerant of all men.

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.

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.

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

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.

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

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

Men hate the individual whom they call avaricious only because nothing can be gained from him.

The best is the enemy of the good.

The superfluous, a very necessary thing.

All men are born with a nose and ten fingers, but no one was born with a knowledge of God.

It is one of the superstitions of the human mind to have imagined that virginity could be a virtue.

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

Stand upright, speak thy thoughts, declare The truth thou hast, that all may share; Be bold, proclaim it everywhere: They only live who dare.

Nothing can be more contrary to religion and the clergy than reason and common sense.

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

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

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

In general, the art of government consists of taking as much money as possible from one class of citizens to give to another.

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.

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

Superstition is to religion what astrology is to astronomy the mad daughter of a wise mother. These daughters have too long dominated the earth.

We are rarely proud when we are alone.

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

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

In this country it is a good thing to kill an admiral from time to time to encourage the others.

An ideal form of government is democracy tempered with assassination.

Prejudices are what fools use for reason.

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

We are all full of weakness and errors; let us mutually pardon each other our follies – it is the first law of nature.

When he to whom one speaks does not understand, and he who speaks himself does not understand, that is metaphysics.

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

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

I know many books which have bored their readers, but I know of none which has done real evil.

Illusion is the first of all pleasures.

The truths of religion are never so well understood as by those who have lost the power of reason.

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.

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

Clever tyrants are never punished.

The infinitely little have a pride infinitely great.

Society therefore is an ancient as the world.

Do well and you will have no need for ancestors.