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Leave Those Vain Moralists, My Friend, And Return To The Depth Of Your Soul: That Is Where You Will Always Rediscover The Source Of The Sacred Fire Which So Often Inflamed Us With Love Of The Sublime Virtues; That Is Where You Will See The Eternal Image Of True Beauty, The Contemplation Of Which Inspires Us With A Holy Enthusiasm.

-Jean-Jacques Rousseau

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Leave Those Vain Moralists,

Jean-Jacques Rousseau

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Leave Those Vain Moralists, My Friend, And Return To The Depth Of Your Soul: That Is Where You Will Always Rediscover The Source Of The Sacred Fire Which So Often Inflamed Us With Love Of The Sublime Virtues; That Is Where You Will See The Eternal Image Of True Beauty, The Contemplation Of Which Inspires Us With A Holy Enthusiasm.

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It Is Always A Poor Way Of Reading The Hearts Of Others To Try To Conceal Our Own. [fr., C'est Toujours Un Mauvais Moyen De Lire Dans Le Coeur Des Autres Que D'affecter De Cacher Le Sien.]

The English People Think They Are Free; They Are Greatly Deceived; They Are Free Only During The Election Of Members Of Parliament.

Ruthless Man: You Begin By Slaying The Animal And Then You Devour It, As If To Slay It Twice. It Is Not Enough. You Turn Against The Dead Flesh, It Revolts You, It Must Be Transformed By Fire, Boiled And Roasted, Seasoned And Disguised With Drugs; You Must Have Butchers, Cooks, Turnspits, Men Who Will Rid The Murder Of Its Horrors, Who Will Dress The Dead Bodies So That The Taste Decieved By These Disguises Will Not Reject What Is Strange To It, And Will Feast On Corpses, The Very Sight Of Which Would Sicken You.

Days Of Absence, Sad And Dreary, Clothed In Sorrow's Dark Array, - Days Of Absence, I Am Weary; She I Love Is Far Away.

A Man Speaks Of What He Knows, A Woman Of What Pleases Her: The One Requires Knowledge, The Other Taste.

That Man Is Truly Free Who Desires What He Is Able To Perform, And Does What He Desires.

If There Were A Nation Of Gods, It Would Govern Itself Democratically. A Government So Perfect Is Not Suited To Men.

Ah, That Is A Perfume In Which I Delight; When They Roast Coffee Near My House, I Hasten To Open The Door To Take In All The Aroma.

The Training Of Children Is A Profession, Where We Must Know How To Waste Time In Order To Save It.

Our Greatest Evils Flow From Ourselves.

We Are Reduced To Asking Others What We Are. We Never Dare To Ask Ourselves.

Do Not Base Your Life On The Judgments Of Others; First, Because They Are As Likely To Be Mistaken As You Are, And Further, Because You Cannot Know That They Are Telling You Their True Thoughts.

Living Is Not Breathing But Doing.

It Is Easier To Conquer Than To Administer. With Enough Leverage, A Finger Could Overturn The World; But To Support The World, One Must Have The Shoulders Of Hercules.

Socrates Dies With Honor, Surrounded By His Disciples Listening To The Most Tender Words -the Easiest Death That One Could Wish To Die. Jesus Dies In Pain, Dishonor, Mockery, The Object Of Universal Cursing - The Most Horrible Death That One Could Fear. At The Receipt Of The Cup Of Poison, Socrates Blesses Him Who Could Not Give It To Him Without Tears; Jesus, While Suffering The Sharpest Pains, Prays For His Most Bitter Enemies. If Socrates Lived And Died Like A Philosopher, Jesus Lived And Died Like A God.

Whatever May Be Our Natural Talents, The Art Of Writing Is Not Acquired All At Once.

We Are Born, So To Speak, Twice Over; Born Into Existence, And Born Into Life; Born A Human Being, And Born A Man.

Leave Those Vain Moralists, My Friend, And Return To The Depth Of Your Soul: That Is Where You Will Always Rediscover The Source Of The Sacred Fire Which So Often Inflamed Us With Love Of The Sublime Virtues; That Is Where You Will See The Eternal Image Of True Beauty, The Contemplation Of Which Inspires Us With A Holy Enthusiasm.

Accent Is The Soul Of Language; It Gives To It Both Feeling And Truth.

There Are Two Things To Be Considered With Regard To Any Scheme. In The First Place, Is It Good In Itself? In The Second, Can It Be Easily Put Into Practice?

There Is Peace In Dungeons, But Is That Enough To Make Dungeons Desirable?

Social Contract

Take The Course Opposite To Custom And You Will Almost Always Do Well.

I Remembered The Way Out Suggested By A Great Princess When Told That The Peasants Had No Bread: "well, Let Them Eat Cake".

Generally We Obtain Very Surely And Very Speedily What We Are Not Too Anxious To Obtain.

Innocence Is Ashamed Of Nothing.

All That Time Is Lost Which Might Be Better Employed.

Government Originated In The Attempt To Find A Form Of Association That Defends And Protects The Person And Property Of Each With The Common Force Of All.

Man Is Born Free And Everywhere He Is In Chains.

If Socrates Died Like A Philosopher, Jesus Christ Died Like A God.

At Length I Recollected The Thoughtless Saying Of A Great Princess, Who, On Being Informed That The Country People Had No Bread, Replied, "let Them Eat Cake".

Temperance And Labor Are The Two Best Physicians Of Man; Labor Sharpens The Appetite, And Temperance Prevents From Indulging To Excess

There Are Always Four Sides To A Story: Your Side, Their Side, The Truth And What Really Happened.

Trust Your Heart Rather Than Your Head.

Trust Your Heart

Taste Is, So To Speak, The Microscope Of The Judgment.

Taste And Judgment

Every Man Having Been Born Free And Master Of Himself, No One Else May Under Any Pretext Whatever Subject Him Without His Consent. To Assert That The Son Of A Slave Is Born A Slave Is To Assert That He Is Not Born A Man.

Abstaining So As Really To Enjoy, Is The Epicurism, The Very Perfection, Of Reason.

In The North The First Words Are, Help Me; In The South, Love Me.

A Child Who Passes Through Many Hands In Turn, Can Never Be Well Brought Up. At Every Change He Makes A Secret Comparison, Which Continually Tends To Lessen His Respect For Those Who Control Him, And With It Their Authority Over Him. If Once He Thinks There Are Grown-up People With No More Sense Than Children The Authority Of Age Is Destroyed And His Education Is Ruined.

Conscience Is The Voice Of The Soul, The Passions Are The Voice Of The Body. Is It Astonishing That Often These Two Languages Contradict Each Other, And Then To Which Must We Listen? Too Often Reason Deceives Us; We Have Only Too Much Acquired The Right Of Refusing To Listen To It; But Conscience Never Deceives Us; It Is The True Guide Of Man; It Is To Man What Instinct Is To The Body; Which Follows It, Obeys Nature, And Never Is Afraid Of Going Astray.

All Through Life A Man Has Need Of A Counsellor And Guide.

Being Wealthy Isn't Just A Question Of Having Lots Of Money. It's A Question Of What We Want. Wealth Isn't An Absolute, It's Relative To Desire. Every Time We Seek Something That We Can't Afford, We Can Be Counted As Poor, How Much Money We May Actually Have.

Love, Known To The Person By Whom It Is Inspired, Becomes More Bearable.

People Who Know Little Are Usually Great Talkers, While Men Who Know Much Say Little.

Fame Is But The Breath Of People, And That Often Unwholesome.

I Don't Know What Is Truth,but I Can Tell You How To Find It!

Not All The Subtilties Of Metaphysics Can Make Me Doubt A Moment Of The Immortality Of The Soul, And Of A Beneficent Providence. I Feel It, I Believe It, I Desire It, I Hope It, And Will Defend It To My Last Breath.

One Must Choose Between Making A Man Or A Citizen, For One Cannot Make Both At The Same Time.

We Lose All That Time Which We Might Employ Better.

Social Man Lives Constantly Outside Himself.

If All Were Perfect Christians, Individuals Would Do Their Duty; The People Would Be Obedient To The Laws, The Magistrates Incorrupt, And There Would Be Neither Vanity Nor Luxury In Such A State.

Virtue Is A State Of War, And To Live In It We Have Always To Combat With Ourselves.

The Science Of Government Is Only A Science Of Combinations, Of Applications, And Of Exceptions, According To Times, Places And Circumstances.

Every Blue-stocking Will Remain A Spinster As Long As There Are Sensible Men On The Earth. [fr., Toute Fille Lettree Restera Fille Toute Sa Vie, Quand Il N'y Aura Que Des Hommes Senses Sur La Terre.]

Religious Persecutors Are Not Believers, They Are Rascals.

An Intelligent Being, Is The Active Principle Of All Things. One Must Have Renounced All Common Sense To Doubt It, And It Is A Waste Of Time To Try To Prove Such Self Evident Truth.

When My Reason Is Afloat, My Faith Cannot Long Remain In Suspense, And I Believe In God As Firmly As In Any Other Truth Whatever; In Short, A Thousand Motives Draw Me To The Consolatory Side, And Add The Weight Of Hope To The Equilibrium Of Reason.

Men Will Argue More Philosophically About The Human Heart; But Women Will Read The Heart Of Man Better Than They.

But I Am Mistaken In Speaking Of A Christian Republic; The Terms Are Mutually Exclusive. Christianity Preaches Only Servitude And Dependence. Its Spirit Is So Favorable To Tyranny That It Always Profits By Such A Regime. True Christians Are Made To Be Slaves, And They Know It And Do Not Much Mind; This Short Life Counts For Too Little In Their Eyes.

Liberty Is Obedience To The Law Which One Has Laid Down For Oneself

The Money You Have Gives You Freedom; The Money You Pursue Enslaves You.

We Cannot Work For Others Without Working For Ourselves.

Sacrifice Life To Truth.

I Had Been Brought Up In A Church Which Decides Everything And Permits No Doubts, So That Having Rejected One Article Of Faith I Was Forced To Reject The Rest.

Gratitude Is A Duty Which Ought To Be Paid, But Which None Have A Right To Expect.

Inspirational Christmas

To Write A Good Love Letter, You Ought To Begin Without Knowing What You Mean To Say, And To Finish Without Knowing What You Have Written.

It Has Always Pleased Me To Read While Eating If I Have No Companion; It Gives Me The Society I Lack. I Devour Alternately A Page And A Mouthful; It Is As Though My Book Were Dining With Me.

Once You Teach People To Say What They Do Not Understand, It Is Easy Enough To Get Them To Say Anything You Like. V One Could Wish No Easier Death Than That Of Socrates, Calmly Discussing Philosophy With His Friends; One Could Fear Nothing Worse Than That Of Jesus, Dying In Torment, Among The Insults, The Mockery, The Curses Of The Whole Nation. In The Midst Of These Terrible Sufferings, Jesus Prays For His Cruel Murderers. Yes, If The Life And Death Of Socrates Are Those Of A Philosopher, The Life And Death Of Christ Are Those Of A God.

To Live Is Not To Breathe But To Act. It Is To Make Use Of Our Organs, Our Senses, Our Faculties, Of All The Parts Of Ourselves Which Give Us The Sentiment Of Our Existence. The Man Who Has Lived The Most Is Not He Who Has Counted The Most Years But He Who Has Most Felt Life.

Jewish Authors Would Never Have Invented Either That Style Nor That Morality; And The Gospel Has Marks Of Truth So Great, So Striking, So Utterly Inimitable, That The Invention Of It Would Be More Astonishing Than The Hero.

A Citizen Should Render To The State All The Services He Can As Soon As The Sovereign Demands Them.

I Think We Cannot Too Strongly Attack Superstition, Which Is The Disturber Of Society; Nor Too Highly Respect Genuine Religion, Which Is The Support Of It.

And When The Relics Of Humanity Left Among The Spaniards Induced Them To Forbid Their Lawyers To Set Foot In America, What Must They Have Thought Of Jurisprudence? May It Not Be Said That They Thought, By This Single Expedient, To Make Reparation For All The Outrages They Had Committed Against The Unhappy Indians?

Childhood Has It's Own Way Of Seeing, Thinking, And Feeling, And Nothing Is More Foolish Than To Try To Substitute Ours For Theirs.

Your First Duty Is To Be Humane. Love Childhood. Look With Friendly Eyes On Its Games, Its Pleasures, Its Amiable Dispositions. Which Of You Does Not Sometimes Look Back Regretfully On The Age When Laughter Was Ever On The Lips And The Heart Free Of Care? Why Steal From The Little Innocents The Enjoyment Of A Time That Passes All Too Quickly?

Education Is Either From Nature, From Man Or From Things. The Developing Of Our Faculties And Organs Is The Education Of Nature; That Of Man Is The Application We Learn To Make Of This Very Developing; And That Of Things Is The Experience We Acquire In Regard To The Different Objects By Which We Are Affected. All That We Have Not At Our Birth, And That We Stand In Need Of At The Years Of Maturity, Is The Gift Of Education.

The Infant, On Opening His Eyes, Ought To See His Country, And To The Hour Of His Death Never Lose Sight Of It.

The Mechanism She Employs Is Much More Powerful Than Ours, For All Her Levers Move The Human Heart.

To Renounce Liberty Is To Renounce Being A Man, To Surrender The Rights Of Humanity And Even Its Duties. For He Who Renounces Everything No Indemnity Is Possible. Such A Renunciation Is Incompatible With Man's Nature; To Remove All Liberty From His Will Is To Remove All Morality From His Acts.

At Sixteen, The Adolescent Knows About Suffering Because He Himself Has Suffered, But He Barely Knows That Other Beings Also Suffer.

What, Then, Is The Government? An Intermediary Body Established Between The Subjects And The Sovereign For Their Mutual Communication, And Charged With The Execution Of The Laws And The Maintenance Of Freedom, Civil As Well As Political.

To Live Is Not Breathing It Is Action.

Reading, Solitude, Idleness, A Soft And Sedentary Life, Intercourse With Women And Young People, These Are Perilous Paths For A Young Man, And These Lead Him Constantly Into Danger.

To Endure Is The First Thing That A Child Ought To Learn, And That Which He Will Have The Most Need To Know.

Every Free Action Has Two Causes That Come Together To Produce It. One Is Moral, The Will That Determines The Act; The Other Is Physical, The Power That Executes The Will To Act.

I Prefer Liberty With Danger Than Peace With Slavery.

Since Men Cannot Create New Forces, But Merely Combine And Control Those Which Already Exist, The Only Way In Which They Can Preserve Themselves Is By Uniting Their Separate Powers In A Combination Strong Enough To Overcome Any Resistance, Uniting Them So That Their Powers Are Directed By A Single Motive And Act In Concert.

Nature Wants Children To Be Children Before Men... Childhood Has Its Own Seeing, Thinking And Feeling.

In The Strict Sense Of The Term, A True Democracy Has Never Existed, And Never Will Exist.

Democracies Have

The World Is The Book Of Women. Whatever Knowledge They May Possess Is More Commonly Acquired By Observation Than By Reading.

Provided A Man Is Not Mad, He Can Be Cured Of Every Folly But Vanity; There Is No Cure For This But Experience, If Indeed There Is Any Cure For It At All.

One Thinks Himself The Master Of Others, And Still Remains A Greater Slave Than They.

All Of My Misfortunes Come From Having Thought Too Well Of My Fellows.

Base Souls Have No Faith In Great Individuals.

No True Believer Could Be Intolerant Or A Persecutor. If I Were A Magistrate And The Law Carried The Death Penalty Against Atheists, I Would Begin By Sending To The Stake Whoever Denounced Another.

Happiness: A Good Bank Account, A Good Cook, And A Good Digestion.

I Have Resolved On An Enterprise That Has No Precedent And Will Have No Imitator. I Want To Set Before My Fellow Human Beings A Man In Every Way True To Nature; And That Man Will Be Myself.

The Want Of Occupation Is No Less The Plague Of Society Than Of Solitude.

I May Be No Better, But At Least I Am Different.

Falsehood Has An Infinity Of Combinations, But Truth Has Only One Mode Of Being.

Our Greatest Evil Flows From Ourselves.

There Is A Period Of Life When We Go Back As We Advance. [fr., Il Est Un Terme De La Vie Au-dela Duquel En Retrograde En Avancant.]

Inopportune Consolations Increase A Deep Sorrow.

The Strength Of The People Is Effective Only If It Is Concentrated; It Evaporates And Is Lost When It Is Dispersed, Just As Gunpowder Scattered On The Ground Ignites Only Grain By Grain.

How Many Famous And High-spirited Heroes Have Lived A Day Too Long?

She Was Dull, Unattractive, Couldn't Tell The Time, Count Money Or Tie Her Own Shoe Laces... But I Loved Her

Rather Suffer An Injustice Than Commit One.

As Evening Approached, I Came Down From The Heights Of The Island, And I Liked Then To Go And Sit On The Shingle In Some Secluded Spot By The Lake; There The Noise Of The Waves And The Movement Of The Water, Taking Hold Of My Senses And Driving All Other Agitation From My Soul, Would Plunge Me Into Delicious Reverie In Which Night Often Stole Upon Me Unawares.

Men, In General, Are Not This Or That, They Are What They Are Made To Be.

It Is Not Our Criminal Actions That Require Courage To Confess, But Those Which Are Ridiculous And Foolish.

Girls Must Be Thwarted Early In Life.

British History

The World Of Reality Has Its Limits; The World Of Imagination Is Boundless.

Self-love Is An Instrument Useful But Dangerous; It Often Wounds The Hand Which Makes Use Of It, And Seldom Does Good Without Doing Harm.

The One Thing We Do Not Know Is The Limit Of The Knowable.

Do You Not Know...that A Child Badly Taught Is Farther From Being Wise Than One Not Taught At All?

It Is Hard To Prevent Oneself From Believing What One So Keenly Desires.

Every Man Has A Right To Risk His Own Life For The Preservation Of It.

Whoever Blushes Confesses Guilt, True Innocence Never Feels Shame.

In All The Ills That Befall Us, We Are More Concerned By The Intention Than The Result. A Tile That Falls Off A Roof May Injure Us More Seriously, But It Will Not Wound Us So Deeply As A Stone Thrown Deliberately By A Malevolent Hand. The Blow May Miss, But The Intention Always Strikes Home.

What Good Would It Be To Possess The Whole Universe If One Were Its Only Survivor?

The Only Moral Lesson Which Is Suited For A Child--the Most Important Lesson For Every Time Of Life--is This: 'never Hurt Anybody.

In Truth, Laws Are Always Useful To Those With Possessions And Harmful To Those Who Have Nothing; From Which It Follows That The Social State Is Advantageous To Men Only When All Possess Something And None Has Too Much.

The Opportunity Of Making Happy Is More Scarce Than We Imagine; The Punishment Of Missing It Is, Never To Meet With It Again; And The Use We Make Of It Leaves Us An Eternal Sentiment Of Satisfaction Or Repentance.

I Would Rather Be A Man Of Paradoxes Than A Man Of Prejudices.

I Hate Books; They Only Teach Us To Talk About Things We Know Nothing About.

Childhood Is The Sleep Of Reason.

The Body Politic, As Well As The Human Body, Begins To Die As Soon As It Is Born, And Carries Itself The Causes Of Its Destruction.

That Which Renders Life Burdensome To Us Generally Arises From The Abuse Of It.

He Who Eats In Idleness That Which He Himself Has Not Earned, Steals It; And A Capitalist Whom The State Pays For Doing Nothing Differs Little In My Eyes From A Brigand, Who Lives At The Expense Of Passers-by.

It Is As If My Heart And My Brain Did Not Belong To The Same Person. Feelings Come Quicker Than Lightning And Fill My Soul, But They Bring Me No Illumination; They Burn Me And Dazzle Me.

To Discover The Rules Of Society That Are Best Suited To Nations, There Would Need To Exist A Superior Intelligence, Who Could Understand The Passions Of Men Without Feeling Any Of Them, Who Had No Affinity With Our Nature But Knew It To The Full, Whose Happiness Was Independent Of Ours, But Who Would Nevertheless Make Our Happiness His Concern, Who Would Be Content To Wait In The Fullness Of Time For A Distant Glory, And To Labour In One Age To Enjoy The Fruits In Another. Gods Would Be Needed To Give Men Laws.

A Person Who Can Break Wind Is Not Dead.

I Also Realized That The Philosophers, Far From Ridding Me Of My Vain Doubts, Only Multiplied The Doubts That Tormented Me And Failed To Remove Any One Of Them. So I Chose Another Guide And Said, Let Me Follow The Inner Light; It Will Not Lead Me So Far Astray As Others Have Done, Or If It Does It Will Be My Own Fault, And I Shall Not Go So Far Wrong If I Follow My Own Illusions As If I Trusted To Their Deceits.

I Hate Books; They Only Teach People To Talk About What They Don't Understand.

Every Artists Wants To Be Applauded

If There Wasn't A God We Would Have To Invent One To Keep People Sane.

As Soon As Any Man Says Of The Affairs Of The State "what Does It Matter To Me?" The State May Be Given Up For Lost.

Peter Had A Genius For Imitation; But He Lacked True Genius, Which Is Creative And Makes All From Nothing.

He Who Pretends To Look Upon Death Without Fear, Lies

Our Will Is Always For Our Own Good, But We Do Not Always See What That Is; The People Is Never Corrupted, But It Is Often Deceived, And On Such Occasions Only Does It Seem To Will What Is Bad.

Everything Made By Man May Be Destroyed By Man; There Are No Ineffaceable Characters Except Those Engraved By Nature; And Nature Makes Neither Princes Nor Rich Men Nor Great Lords.

Those People Who Treat Politics And Morality Separately Will Never Understand Either Of Them.

Quit Thy Childhood, My Friend, And Wake Up!

Yes, If The Life And Death Of Socrates Are Those Of A Wise Man, The Life And Death Of Jesus Are Those Of A God.

Let The Trumpet Of The Day Of Judgment Sound When It Will, I Shall Appear With This Book In My Hand Before The Sovereign Judge, And Cry With A Loud Voice, This Is My Work, There Were My Thoughts, And Thus Was I. I Have Freely Told Both The Good And The Bad, Have Hid Nothing Wicked, Added Nothing Good.

Consolation Indiscreetly Pressed Upon Us, When We Are Suffering Undue Affliction, Only Serves To Increase Our Pain, And To Render Our Grief More Poignant.

Plants Are Shaped By Cultivation And Men By Education. .. We Are Born Weak, We Need Strength; We Are Born Totally Unprovided, We Need Aid; We Are Born Stupid, We Need Judgment. Everything We Do Not Have At Our Birth And Which We Need When We Are Grown Is Given Us By Education.

Too Much Apparatus, Designed To Guide Us In Experiments And To Supplement The Exactness Of Our Senses, Makes Us Neglect To Use Those Senses...the More Ingenious Our Apparatus, The Coarser And More Unskillful Are Our Senses. We Surround Ourselves With Tools And Fail To Use Those Which Nature Has Provided Every One Of Us.

I Feel An Indescribable Ecstasy And Delirium In Melting, As It Were, Into The System Of Being, In Identifying Myself With The Whole Of Nature.

I Have Suffered Too Much In This World Not To Hope For Another.

World Suffering

I May Not Amount To Much, But At Least I Am Unique.

Absolute Silence Leads To Sadness. It Is The Image Of Death.

Everything Is In Constant Flux On This Earth. Nothing Keeps The Same Unchanging Shape, And Our Affections, Being Attached To Things Outside Us, Necessarily Change And Pass Away As They Do. Always Out Ahead Of Us Or Lagging Behind, They Recall A Past Which Is Gone Or Anticipate A Future Which May Never Come Into Being; There Is Nothing Solid There For The Heart To Attach Itself To. Thus Our Earthly Joys Are Almost Without Exception The Creatures Of A Moment.

Or, Rather, Let Us Be More Simple And Less Vain.

The Falsification Of History Has Done More To Impede Human Development Than Any One Thing Known To Mankind.

If I Am Part Of A Group Of 100 People, Do 99 People Have The Right To Sentence Me To Death, Just Because They Are Majority?

Men And Women Are Made For Each Other, But Their Mutual Dependence Differs In Degrees; Man Is Dependent On Woman Through His Desires; Woman Is Dependent On Man Through Her Desires And Also Through Her Needs; He Could Do Without Her Better Than She Can Do Without Him. She Cannot Fulfill Her Purpose In Life Without His Aid, Without His Goodwill, Without His Respect.....nature Herself Has Decreed That Woman, Both For Herself And Her Children, Should Be At The Mercy Of Man S Judgment.

Liberty May Be Gained, But Can Never Be Recovered.

If, By Chance, Someone Among Those Men Of Extraordinary Talent Is Found Who Has Firmness Of Soul And Who Refuses To Yield To The Genius Of His Age And To Debase Himself With Childish Works, Woe Unto Him! He Will Die In Poverty And Oblivion.

I Have Never Believed That Man's Freedom Consisted In Doing What He Wants, But Rather In Never Doing What He Does Not Want To Do.

Posterity Is Always Just.

You Forget That The Fruits Belong To All And That The Land Belongs To No One.

Sovereigns Always See With Pleasure A Taste For The Arts Of Amusement And Superfluity, Which Do Not Result In The Exportation Of Bullion, Increase Among Their Subjects. They Very Well Know That, Besides Nourishing That Littleness Of Mind Which Is Proper To Slavery, The Increase Of Artificial Wants Only Binds So Many More Chains Upon The People.

I Have Never Thought, For My Part, That Man's Freedom Consists In His Being Able To Do Whatever He Wills, But That He Should Not, By Any Human Power, Be Forced To Do What Is Against His Will.

Smell Is The Sense Of Memory And Desire.

Her Dignity Consists In Being Unknown To The World; Her Glory Is In The Esteem Of Her Husband; Her Pleasures In The Happiness Of Her Family.

Reason Deceives Us; Conscience, Never.

To Study Men, We Must Look Close By; To Study Man, We Must Learn To Look Afar; If We Are To Discover Essential Characteristics, We Must First Observe Differences.

There Exists One Book, Which, To My Taste, Furnishes The Happiest Treatise Of Natural Education. What Then Is This Marvelous Book? Is It Aristotle? Is It Pliny, Is It Buffon? No-it Is Robinson Crusoe.

In A Well Governed State, There Are Few Punishments, Not Because There Are Many Pardons, But Because Criminals Are Rare; It Is When A State Is In Decay That The Multitude Of Crimes Is A Gaurantee Of Impunity.

To Abstain That We May Enjoy Is The Epicurianism Of Reason.

It Is In Man's Heart That The Life Of Nature's Spectacle Exists; To See It, One Must Feel It.

Had I No Other Proof Of The Immortality Of The Soul Than The Oppression Of The Just And The Triumph Of The Wicked In This World, This Alone Would Prevent My Having The Least Doubt Of It. So Shocking A Discord Amidst A General Harmony Of Things Would Make Me Naturally Look For A Cause; I Should Say To Myself We Do Not Cease To Exist With This Life; Everything Reassumes Its Order After Death.

A Feeble Body Weakens The Mind.

We Are Born Weak, We Need Strength; Helpless, We Need Aid; Foolish, We Need Reason. All That We Lack At Birth, All That We Need When We Come To Man's Estate, Is The Gift Of Education.

Men Speak From Knowledge, Women From Imagination.

The Writings Of Women Are Always Cold And Pretty Like Themselves. There Is As Much Wit As You May Desire, But Never Any Soul.

A Man Who Is Not A Fool Can Rid Himself Of Every Folly Except Vanity.

The Strongest Is Never Strong Enough To Be Always The Master, Unless He Transforms Strength Into Right, And Obedience Into Duty.

God Made Me And Broke The Mold.

To Be Sane In A World Of Madman Is In Itself Madness.

The General Will Is Always Right.

It Is Manifestly Contrary To The Law Of Nature, However Defined, That A Handful Of People Should Gorge Themselves With Superfluities While The Hungry Majority Goes In Need Of Necessities.

It Is To Law Alone That Men Owe Justice And Liberty. It Is This Salutary Organ, Of The Will Of All Which Establishes In Civil Rights The Natural Equality Between Men. It Is This Celestial Voice Which Dictates To Each Citizen The Precepts Of Public Reason, And Teaches Him To Act According To The Rules Of His Own Judgment And Not To Behave Inconsistently With Himself. It Is With This Voice Alone That Political Leaders Should Speak When. They Command.

Equality Is Deemed By Many A Mere Speculative Chimera, Which Can Never Be Reduced To Practice. But If The Abuse Is Inevitable, Does It Follow That We Ought Not To Try At Least To Mitigate It? It Is Precisely Because The Force Of Things Tends Always To Destroy Equality That The Force Of The Legislature Must Always Tend To Maintain It.

As Long As There Are Rich People In The World, They Will Be Desirous Of Distinguishing Themselves From The Poor.

The Freedom Of Mankind Does Not Lie In The Fact That Can Do What We Want, But That We Do Not Have To Do That Which We Do Not Want.

Teach Your Scholar To Observe The Phenomena Of Nature; You Will Soon Rouse His Curiosity, But If You Would Have It Grow, Do Not Be In Too Great A Hurry To Satisfy This Curiosity. Put The Problems Before Him And Let Him Solve Them Himself. Let Him Know Nothing Because You Have Told Him, But Because He Has Learnt It For Himself. Let Him Not Be Taught Science, Let Him Discover It. If Ever You Substitute Authority For Reason He Will Cease To Reason; He Will Be A Mere Plaything Of Other People's Thoughts.

Many Men, Seemingly Impelled By Fortune, Hasten Forward To Meet Misfortune Half Way.

Women Speak At An Earlier Age, More Easily, And More Agreeably Than Men; They Are Accused Also Of Speaking More; This Is As It Should Be, And I Willingly Change The Reproach Into A Eulogy.

Presence Of Mind, Penetration, Fine Observation, Are The Sciences Of Women; Ability To Avail Themselves Of These Is Their Talent.

Presence Of Mind

The Indifference Of Children Towards Meat Is One Proof That The Taste For Meat Is Unnatural; Their Preference Is For Vegetable Foods...beware Of Changing This Natural Taste And Making Children Flesh-eaters, If Not For Their Health's Sake, For The Sake Of Their Character; For How Can One Explain Away The Fact That Great Meat-eaters Are Usually Fiercer And More Cruel Than Other Men; This Has Been Recognised At All Times And In All Places.

To Try To Conceal Our Own Heart Is A Bad Means To Read That Of Others.

Remorse Sleeps In The Atmosphere Of Prosperity.

Never Exceed Your Rights, And They Will Soon Become Unlimited.

The Greatest Braggarts Are Usually The Biggest Cowards.

The Passions Are The Voice Of The Body.

The English People Believes Itself To Be Free; It Is Gravely Mistaken; It Is Free Only During Election Of Members Of Parliament; As Soon As The Members Are Elected, The People Is Enslaved; It Is Nothing. In The Brief Moment Of Its Freedom, The English People Makes Such A Use Of That Freedom That It Deserves To Lose It.

The Taste For Splendor Is Hardly Ever Combined In The Same Souls With The Taste For The Honorable.

Slaves Lose Everything In Their Chains, Even The Desire Of Escaping From Them.

Do I Dare Set Forth Here The Most Important, The Most Useful Rule Of All Education? It Is Not To Save Time, But To Squander It.

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