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Distrust Even Mathematics; Albeit So Sublime And Highly Perfected, We Have Here A Machine Of Such Delicacy It Can Only Work In Vacuo, And One Grain Of Sand In The Wheels Is Enough To Put Everything Out Of Gear. One Shudders To Think To What Disaster Such A Grain Of Sand May Bring A Mathematical Brain. Remember Pascal.

-Anatole France

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Distrust Even Mathematics; Albeit

Anatole France

...

Distrust Even Mathematics; Albeit So Sublime And Highly Perfected, We Have Here A Machine Of Such Delicacy It Can Only Work In Vacuo, And One Grain Of Sand In The Wheels Is Enough To Put Everything Out Of Gear. One Shudders To Think To What Disaster Such A Grain Of Sand May Bring A Mathematical Brain. Remember Pascal.

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War Will Disappear Only When Men Shall Take No Part Whatever In Violence And Shall Be Ready To Suffer Every Persecution That Their Abstention Will Bring Them. It Is The Only Way To Abolish War.

The Finest Words In The World Are Only Vain Sounds If You Can't Understand Them. The Best Sentence? The Shortest.

Truth Possesses Within Herself A Penetrating Force, Unknown Alike To Error And Falsehood. I Say 'truth' And You Understand My Meaning. For The Beautiful Words Truth And Justice Need Not To Be Defined In Order To Be Understood In Their True Sense.

History Books That Contain No Lies Are Extremely Dull.

Religion Has Done Love A Great Service By Making It A Sin.

Man Is A Rational Animal. He Can Think Up A Reason For Anything He Wants To Believe.

There Are Very Honest People Who Do Not Think That They Have Had A Bargain Unless They Have Cheated A Merchant.

In Its Majestic Equality, The Law Forbids Rich And Poor Alike To Sleep Under Bridges, Beg In The Streets And Steal Loaves Of Bread.

It's Not By Amusing Oneself That One Learns.

Suffering... We Owe To It All That Is Good In Us, All That Gives Value To Life; We Owe To It Pity, We Owe To It Courage, We Owe To It All The Virtues.

Ignorance And Error Are Necessary To Life, Like Bread And Water.

For A Man’s Life Would Become Intolerable, If He Knew What Was Going To Happen To Him. He Would Be Made Aware Of Future Evils, And Would Suffer Their Agonies In Advance, While He Would Get No Joy Of Present Blessings Since He Would Know How They Would End. Ignorance Is The Necessary Condition Of Human Happiness, And It Has To Be Admitted That On The Whole Mankind Observes That Condition Well. We Are Almost Entirely Ignorant Of Ourselves; Absolutely Of Others. In Ignorance, We Find Our Bliss; In Illusions, Our Happiness.

The Books That Everybody Admires Are Those That Nobody Reads.

In Order That Knowledge Be Properly Digested It Must Have Been Swallowed With A Good Appetite.

All The Good Writers Of Confessions, From Augustine Onwards, Are Men Who Are Still A Little In Love With Their Sins.

True Education Is The Ability To Discern The Difference Between What You Do Know And What You Don't.

Jealousy Is A Virtue Of Democracies Which Preserves Them From Tyrants.

Men Are Not Created To Know, Men Are Not Created To Understand ... And Our Illusions Increase With Our Knowledge.

A Dictionary Is Merely The Universe Arranged In Alphabetical Order.

Alphabetical Order

To Accomplish Great Things, We Must Not Only Act, But Also Dream; Not Only Plan, But Also Believe.

It Is Not Easy To Be A Pretty Woman Without Causing Mischief.

Ugly Women May Be Naturally Quite As Capricious As Pretty Ones; But As They Are Never Petted And Spoiled, And As No Allowances Are Made For Them, They Soon Find Themselves Obliged Either To Suppress Their Whims Or To Hide Them.

It Is By Acts And Not By Ideas That People Live.

You Think You Are Dying For Your Country; You Die For The Industrialists.

To Imagine Is Everything, To Know Is Nothing At All.

We Have Drugs To Make Women Speak, But None To Keep Them Silent.

What Can Be More Foolish Than To Think That All This Rare Fabric Of Heaven And Earth Could Come By Chance, When All The Skill Of Art Is Not Able To Make An Oyster!

Never Lend Books, For No One Ever Returns Them

An Education Which Does Not Cultivate The Will Is An Education That Depraves The Mind.

It Is Almost Impossible Systematically To Constitute A Natural Moral Law. Nature Has No Principles. She Furnishes Us With No Reason To Believe That Human Life Is To Be Respected. Nature, In Her Indifference, Makes No Distinction Between Good And Evil.

So Long As Society Is Founded On Injustice, The Function Of The Laws Will Be To Defend Injustice. And The More Unjust They Are The More Respectable They Will Seem.

Caress Your Phrase Tenderly; It Will End By Smiling At You.

The Kingdom Of Heaven Is A Military Autocracy And There Is No Public Opinion In It.

The Power Of Love Itself Weakens And Gradually Becomes Lost With Age, Like All The Other Energies Of Man.

You Learn To Speak By Speaking, To Study By Studying, To Run By Running, To Work By Working; In Just The Same Way, You Learn To Love By Loving.

Until You Have Loved An Animal, Part Of Your Soul Will Have Remained Dormant.

That Man Is Prudent Who Neither Hopes Nor Fears Anything From The Uncertain Events Of The Future.

Our Passions Are Ourselves.

He Flattered Himself On Being A Man Without Any Prejudices; And This Pretension Itself Is A Very Great Prejudice.

If Fifty Million People Say A Foolish Thing, It Is Still A Foolish Thing.

It Is Only The Poor Who Pay Cash, And That Not From Virtue, But Because They Are Refused Credit.

It Is Good To Collect Things, But It Is Better To Go On Walks.

There Are No Bad Books Any More Than There Are Ugly Women.

Lack Of Understanding Is A Great Power. Sometimes It Enables Men To Conquer The World.

Conquer The World

Nothing Spoils A Confession Like Repentance.

No Government Ought To Be Without Censors; And Where The Press Is Free, No One Ever Will. Chance Is The Pseudonym Of God When He Did Not Want To Sign.

The First Virtue Of All Really Great Men Is That They Are Sincere. They Eradicate Hypocrisy From Their Hearts.

A Person Is Never Happy Except At The Price Of Some Ignorance. [the Ability To Focus On Positives And Distract Your Mind From Negatives For At Least A Time Is A Necessary Skill For Being Happy.]

If It Were Absolutely Necessary To Choose, I Would Rather Be Guilty Of An Immoral Act Than Of A Cruel One.

I Do Not Know Any Reading More Easy, More Fascinating, More Delightful Than A Catalogue.

The Whole Art Of Teaching Is Only The Art Of Awakening The Natural Curiosity Of Young Minds For The Purpose Of Satisfying It Afterwards.

The Man Of Science Multiples The Points Of Contact Between Man And Nature.

What Frightens Us Most In A Madman Is His Sane Conversation.

The Future Is Hidden Even From Those Who Are Forging It.

The Arab Who Built Himself A Hut With Marbles From The Temple Of Palmyra Is More Philosophical Than All The Curators Of The Museums Of London, Paris, And Munich.

Irony Is The Gaiety Of Reflection And The Joy Of Wisdom.

In Every Well-governed State Wealth Is A Sacred Thing; In Democracies It Is The Only Sacred Thing.

America, Where Thanks To Congress, There Are Forty Million Laws To Enforce The Ten Commandments.

There Is Only One Science, Love, One Riches, Love, Only One Policy, Love. To Make Love Is All The Law And The Prophets.

For The Majority Of People , Though They Do Not Know What To Do With This Life , Long For Another That Shall Have No End .

Dictionary: The Universe In Alphabetical Order.

Alphabetical Order

A Woman Without Breasts Is Like A Bed Without Pillows.

Justice Is The Means By Which Established Injustices Are Sanctioned

The Law ... Allows Rich As Well As Poor To Sleep Under Bridges.

Word-carpentry Is Like Any Other Kind Of Carpentry: You Must Join Your Sentences Smoothly.

Stupidity Is Far More Dangerous Than Evil, For Evil Takes A Break From Time To Time, Stupidity Does Not.

What Men Call Civilization Is The Condition Of Present Customs; What They Call Barbarism, The Condition Of Past Ones.

Dog! When We First Met On The Highway Of Life, We Came From The Two Poles Of Creation.... What Can Be The Meaning Of The Obscure Love For Me That Has Sprung Up In Your Heart?

All Changes, Even The Most Longed For, Have Their Melancholy; For What We Leave Behind Us Is A Part Of Ourselves; We Must Die To One Life Before We Can Enter Another.

People Changing

Yet, Every Now And Then, There Would Pass A Young Girl, Slender, Fair And Desirable, Arousing In Young Men A Not Ignoble Desire To Possess Her, And Stirring In Old Men Regrets For Ecstasy Not Seized And Now Forever Past.

The Future Is A Convenient Place For Dreams.

To Die For An Idea Is To Set A Rather High Price Upon Conjecture.

Never Lend Books, For No One Ever Returns Them; The Only Books I Have In My Library Are Books That Other Folks Have Left Me.

People Who Have No Weaknesses Are Terrible; There Is No Way Of Taking Advantage Of Them.

It Is Human Nature To Think Wisely And To Act In An Absurd Fashion.

God, Conquered, Will Become Satan; Satan, Conquering, Will Become God. May The Fates Spare Me This Terrible Lot; I Love The Hell Which Formed My Genius. I Love The Earth Where I Have Done Some Good, If It Be Possible To Do Any Good In This Fearful World Where Beings Live But By Rapine.

People Who Don't Count Won't Count.

I Am A Physician. I Keep A Drug-shop Of Lies. I Give Relief, Consolation. Can One Console And Relieve Without Lying? ... Only Women And Doctors Know How Necessary And How Helpful Lies Are To Men.

Sometimes One Day In A Difference Place Gives You More Than Ten Years Of A Life At Home.

Custom Alone Regulates Morals.

You Become A Good Writer Just As You Become A Good Joiner: By Planing Down Your Sentences.

We Reproach People For Talking About Themselves But It Is The Subject They Treat Best.

It Is In The Ability To Deceive Oneself That The Greatest Talent Is Shown.

One Thing Above All Gives Charm To Men's Thoughts, And This Is Unrest. A Mind That Is Not Uneasy Irritates And Bores Me.

Human Affairs Inspire In Noble Hearts Only Two Feelings-admiration Or Pity.

God Forbids Suicide, And Is Unwilling That His Creatures Should Destroy Themselves.

Existence Would Be Intolerable If We Were Never To Dream.

The Law In Its Majesty Prohibits Rich And Poor Alike From Sleeping Under Bridges.

The Truth Is That Life Is Delicious, Horrible, Charming, Frightful, Sweet, Bitter, And That Is Everything.

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The Best Sentence? The Shortest.

Universal Peace Will Be Realized, Not Because Man Will Become Better, But Because A New Order Of Things, A New Science, New Economic Necessities, Will Impose Peace.

In Truth Man Is Made Rather To Eat Ices Than To Pore Over Old Texts.

We Have Never Heard The Devil's Side Of The Story, God Wrote All The Book.

Only Men Who Are Not Interested In Women Are Interested In Women's Clothes. Men Who Like Women Never Notice What They Wear.

Those Who Have Given Themselves The Most Concern About The Happiness Of Peoples Have Made Their Neighbors Very Miserable.

Chance Is The Pseudonym God Uses When He'd Rather Not Sign His Own Name.

It Is Better To Understand Little Than To Misunderstand A Lot.

It Is Only The Poor Who Are Forbidden To Beg.

Armenia Is Dying, But It Will Survive. The Little Blood That It Still Has Left Is Precious Blood That Will Give Birth To A Heroic Generation. A Nation That Does Not Want To Die, Does Not Die.

If The Path Be Beautiful, Let Us Not Ask Where It Leads.

Of All The Ways Of Defining Man, The Worst Is The One Which Makes Him Out To Be A Rational Animal.

The Average Man Does Not Know What To Do With This Life, Yet Wants Another One Which Will Last Forever.

There Is A Certain Impertinence In Allowing Oneself To Be Burned For An Opinion.

Man Is So Made That He Can Only Find Relaxation From One Kind Of Labor By Taking Up Another.

Lovers Who Love Truly Do Not Write Down Their Happiness.

Intelligent Women Always Marry Fools

Intelligent Women

Nature, In Her Indifference, Makes No Distinction Between Good And Evil.

The More You Say, The Less They Remember.

In Art As In Love, Instinct Is Enough.

Justice Is The Sanction Of Established Injustice.

The Duty Of Literature Is To Note What Counts, And To Light Up What Is Suited To The Light. If It Ceases To Choose And To Love, It Becomes Like A Woman Who Gives Herself Without Preference.

Unhappiness Does Make People Look Stupid.

The Heart Errs Like The Head; Its Errors Are Not Any The Less Fatal, And We Have More Trouble Getting Free Of Them Because Of Their Sweetness.

What We Call Happiness Is What We Do Not Know.

Good Angels Are Fallible ... They Sin Every Day And Fall From Heaven Like Flies.

Until One Has Loved An Animal A Part Of One's Soul Remains Unawakened.

We Thank God For Having Created This World, And Praise Him For Having Made Another, Quite Different One, Where The Wrongs Of This One Are Corrected.

The Wonder Is, Not That The Field Of Stars Is So Vast, But That Man Has Measured It.

It Is Not Customary To Love What One Has.

We Chase Dreams And Embrace Shadows.

Innocence Most Often Is A Good Fortune And Not A Virtue.

What We Call Strategy Is Mainly Just Crossing Rivers On Bridges And Passing Mountains Though Cols.

Play Is Hand-to-hand Encounter With Fate.

A People Living Under The Perpetual Menace Of War And Invasion Is Very Easy To Govern. It Demands No Social Reform. It Does Not Haggle Over Expenditures For Armaments And Military Equipment. It Pays Without Discussion, It Ruins Itself, And That Is An Excellent Thing For The Syndicates Of Financiers And Manufacturers For Whom Patriotic Terrors Are An Abundant Source Of Gain.

I Thank Fate For Having Made Me Born Poor. Poverty Taught Me The True Value Of The Gifts Useful To Life.

Distrust Even Mathematics; Albeit So Sublime And Highly Perfected, We Have Here A Machine Of Such Delicacy It Can Only Work In Vacuo, And One Grain Of Sand In The Wheels Is Enough To Put Everything Out Of Gear. One Shudders To Think To What Disaster Such A Grain Of Sand May Bring A Mathematical Brain. Remember Pascal.

Of All Earthly Creatures, Humans Alone Have The Power To Choose. One Must Never Lose Time In Vainly Regretting The Past Nor In Complaining About The Changes Which Cause Us Discomfort, For Change Is The Very Essence Of Life.

Chance Is Perhaps The Pseudonym Of God When He Did Not Want To Sign.

It Is By Acts, And Not By Ideas, That People Ensure The Bar Down The Street Cannot Have A Patio.

Irony And Pity Are Two Good Counselors: One, In Smiling, Makes Life Pleasurable; The Other, Who Cries, Makes It Sacred.

An Education Isn't How Much You Have Committed To Memory, Or Even How Much You Know. It's Being Able To Differentiate Between What You Know And What You Don't.

I Cling To My Imperfection, As The Very Essence Of My Being.

Being Imperfect

It Is By Believing In Roses That You Make Them Bloom.

Do Not Try To Satisfy Your Vanity By Teaching A Great Many Things. Awaken People's Curiosity. It Is Enough To Open Minds; Do Not Overload Them. Put There Just A Spark. If There Is Some Good Inflammable Stuff, It Will Catch Fire.

When A Thing Has Been Said And Well, Have No Scruple. Take It And Copy It.

Time Deals Gently Only With Those Who Take It Gently.

Silence Is The Wit Of Fools.

The Good Critic Is He Who Relates The Adventures Of His Soul Among Masterpieces.

Awaken People's Curiosity. It Is Enough To Open Minds, Do Not Overload Them. Put There Just A Spark.

Devout Believers Are Safeguarded In A High Degree Against The Risk Of Certain Neurotic Illnesses; Their Acceptance Of The Universal Neurosis Spares Them The Task Of Constructing A Personal One.

The Impotence Of God Is Infinite.

The Dog Is A Religious Animal. In His Savage State He Worships The Moon And The Lights That Float Upon The Waters. These Are His Gods To Whom He Appeals At Night With Long-drawn Howls.

The Greatest Virtue Of Man Is Perhaps Curiosity.

The Mania Of Thinking Renders One Unfit For Every Activity.

Nine Tenths Of Education Is Encouragement.

Of All The Sexual Aberrations, Chastity Is The Strangest.

It Is The Certainty That They Possess The Truth That Makes Men Cruel.

For Every Monarchy Overthrown The Sky Becomes Less Brilliant, Because It Loses A Star. A Republic Is Ugliness Set Free.

A Writer Is Rarely So Well Inspired As When He Talks About Himself.

The Faculty Of Doubting Is Rare Among Men. A Few Choice Spirits Carry The Germs Of It In Them, But These Do Not Develop Without Training.

A Simple Style Is Like White Light. Although Complex, It Does Not Appear To Be So.

A Person Is Never Happy Except At The Price Of Some Ignorance.

Christianity Has Done A Great Deal For Love By Making A Sin Of It.

A Good Critic Is The Man Who Describes His Adventures Among Masterpieces.

Change Is The Essence Of Life.

Essence Of Life

Without Lies Humanity Would Perish Of Despair And Boredom.

When A History Book Contains No Lies It Is Always Tedious.

I Ought Not To Fear To Survive My Own People So Long As There Are Men In The World; For There Are Always Some Whom One Can Love.

It Is Well For The Heart To Be Naive And For The Mind Not To Be.

We Live Between Two Dense Clouds; The Forgetting Of What Was And The Uncertainty Of What Will Be.

That Child Whose Mother Has Never Smiled Upon Him Is Worthy Neither Of The Table Of The Gods Nor The Couch Of The Goddesses.

I Prefer The Folly Of Enthusiasm To The Indifference Of Wisdom.

We Find It Hard To Picture To Ourselves The State Of Mind Of A Man Of Older Days Who Firmly Believed That The Earth Was The Centre Of The Universe, And That All The Heavenly Bodies Revolved Around It. He Could Feel Beneath His Feet The Writhings Of The Damned Amid The Flames; Very Likely He Had Seen With His Own Eyes And Smelt With His Own Nostrils The Sulphurous Fumes Of Hell Escaping From Some Fissure In The Rocks. Looking Upwards, He Beheld ... The Incorruptible Firmament, Wherein The Stars Hung Like So Many Lamps.

An Old Philosopher Said To Monsieur Coignard, A Reverend Father: 'you Are A Pig!' To Which Abad Coignard Answered: 'you Flatter Me, Sir. But Unfortunately, I'm Only A Man.'

Wandering Re-establishes The Original Harmony Which Once Existed Between Man And The Universe.

A Tale Without Love Is Like Beef Without Mustard: Insipid.

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