To live in the pure present [...] is the characteristic of a lower animal: the man who proceeds thus is an impulsive one. But he who lives in the past for the pleasure of living there [...] is hardly better adapted to action: a dreamer.
1896
Sometimes be the object of ridicule, and then cast a calm gaze around you. You must be shaken up, so that you learn to know yourself.
c. 108 AD
This poetry gives me the impression of a delicate and clean trellis stretched over a known azure that I love...
1926
There is no difference between letting one's passion be seen, and lending certain weapons for others to make themselves our master.
1636
Terracotta statuette of a woman
early 3rd century BCE
That virtue alone is sufficient for a happy life. [...] Although it seems difficult to be persuaded of this, because of the vicissitudes of fortune, it is a maxim of such importance that every effort must be made to convince minds of it.
45 BC
Any law contrary [to the public interest] is not a law, it is a legal abuse.
1772
The disorders of imagination are extremely contagious, and [...] spread among most minds with great ease.
1674-1675
Let us contemplate the end of our being without sorrow.
63-64 AD
Limestone cippus of Philon
ca. 2nd–3rd century CE
In the circular movement, [the soul] sees justice itself face to face, it sees reason, it sees knowledge.
1953
Love breathes [...] a dormant and covered fire that winter had concealed within our veins.
1546/1563
There remains nothing in us that we should attribute to our soul, except our thoughts, which are [...] the actions of the soul, [and] its passions.
1649
True politicians know men better than those who make a profession of philosophy; I mean that they are truer philosophers.
1746
The Calling of Saint Matthew
ca. 1625–30
Every substance is like a whole world and like a mirror of God or of the whole universe, which each one expresses in its own way, much as the same city is represented differently according to the different positions of the one who looks at it.
1686
It was forbidden to keep more than five hundred livres in specie at home, on pain of confiscation: this was the ultimate degree of a tyrannical absurdity.
1769
Art will only attain a high degree of dignity 'when it is understood, no longer alongside and outside of life, but as an integral part of it [...]'.
1896
Dust does not cling to a perfectly clear mirror; if it clings, it is because the mirror is damp or greasy.
4th century BC
Marble two-sided relief
1st century CE
Reactionary attempts to halt bourgeois development will fail just as surely as the moral enthusiasm and the inflamed proclamations of the democrats.
1850
In the innumerable multitude of ideas, it is impossible for us to discover one that does not originate [...] in our sensations.
1817
Alone, I have never known boredom, even in the most perfect idleness: my imagination, filling all the voids, is enough on its own to occupy me.
1782-1789
Is it our duty to seek to become a finished and complete being, a whole that is self-sufficient, or, on the contrary, to be only a part of a whole, an organ of an organism?
1893
Statuette of a girl
ca. 550–500 BCE
There is nothing which is, in itself, beautiful or ugly, worthy of love or hatred [...] these different qualifications depend solely on the sentiments and affections of each man [...].
1742
We see that, in games [...] the first rules, the first laws are purely positive, purely conventional, rules that must be adopted purely and simply, and without dispute.
1623
Only those who unjustly usurp honors refuse to humble themselves for fear of losing the dignities they have seized without any right.
1263-1264
The soul, afterwards relaxing into tears and complaints, seems to unburden itself, to disentangle, and to become more free and at ease.
1580
A Bouquet of Flowers in a Crystal Vase
1662
[...] the qualities that constitute the essence of the body.
c. 253-270 AD
Prophecies contain only pure dogmas and decrees, because God is represented as [...] not reasoning, but imposing orders [...].
1670
Good upbringing and education, these are the sources of virtue.
c. 387 BC
As the principle of the division of labor is more completely applied, the worker becomes weaker, more narrow-minded, and more dependent. The art progresses, the artisan retrogresses.
1835-1840
Head of Saint John the Baptist
1636
The language of action, then so natural, was a great obstacle to overcome. Could one abandon it for another whose advantages were not yet foreseen, and whose difficulty was so keenly felt?
1746
If we examine the virtues that Christianity recommends, we will see that they are ill-suited for man, that they raise him above his sphere, that they are useless to society, and that they are often of the most dangerous consequence for it.
1766
Freedom, combined with the courage they have to say everything, is, in my opinion, one of the main advantages of their school of thought.
1741-1784
Of all the evils with which tyranny is filled, the worst without a doubt is that among those who call themselves friends of the tyrant, there is not a single one who speaks with frankness.
100-120 AD
Handle attachment
900 BCE - 100 BCE
To know what is to happen, it is enough to consider what has been, because all the events of this world, in all times, have analogous relationships with those that have already passed.
1513-1519
Each person can only truly understand and appreciate that which is homogeneous to them.
1851
In times of trouble, the inhabitants of Paris were obliged, during the night, to place lit lanterns on their windows.
1662
It is entirely superfluous to forbid women what their constitution does not permit them. Competition is sufficient to prevent them from doing anything they cannot do as well as men, their natural competitors.
1869
Terracotta mold of a grotesque figure
2nd–1st century BCE
It is in the social state that the ferments of all this corruption are properly found, which [...] serve [...] to maintain and aggravate it.
1764
By joining together various particular Substances, [the Mind] forms collective ideas of Substances, such as a Troop, an Army, a Swarm, a City, a Fleet.
1689
Nature always strives [to do what is best].
c. 350 BC
To refrain from seeing certain things, from hearing them, from letting them approach you—the first command of wisdom [...].
1888
Portrait of a Woman
ca. 1800