Move me, astonish me, break my heart; make me tremble, weep, shudder, outrage me first; you can feast my eyes afterwards if you can.
1766
Those who are able to see beyond the shadows and lies of their culture will never be understood [...] by the masses.
c. 375 BC
[In myths] [...] that which is by nature eternal is said to be begotten and born.
c. 253-270 AD
I believe [...] that God is, as they say, the immanent cause of all things and not the transitive cause.
1661-1676
Moses and Aaron before Pharaoh: An Allegory of the Dinteville Family
1537
Art, without the assiduous practice of speech, is not of great help, from which you must conclude that practice must be joined to precepts.
86-82 BC
In Religion, [duties] are those which are founded on the relations that exist between men and their Priests. From which we see that it is up to the Priests alone to determine the duties of a good Christian.
1768
Social relations are closely tied to productive forces. In acquiring new productive forces, men change their mode of production [...] they change all their social relations.
1847
There is only a matter of more or less, which changes nothing in the realm of possibilities.
1702
Marble bust of a youth
ca. 140 CE
It is [...] the well-examined particular facts, and the just judgments we make of them, that are the principle of all truth.
1817
Almost everyone receives their ideas ready-made and follows public opinion their whole life. [...] Servile imitators, who say yes or no according to how they've been prompted, and then believe they have decided for themselves.
4th century BC
Content [...] with being a philosopher in reality, he was happy not to appear so, far from being angry about it.
c. 108 AD
To understand all is to despise all.
1888
A Peasant with a Bird
1626
A man who has never left his country usually imagines that the morals and customs of foreigners are contrary to reason because they are contrary to the custom of his own city [...].
1674-1675
[...] the ring of Saturn could be a swarm of small satellites, which would produce for Saturn the appearance that the Milky Way has for the Earth.
1755
The reputation of a man of wit has been attached less to the number and subtlety of his ideas than to the fortunate choice of them.
1758
Our passions are the main instruments of our preservation; it is therefore an undertaking as vain as it is ridiculous to want to destroy them [...].
1762
Saint Bernardino
ca. 1460–70
When the existence of a thing is affirmed to us, and this thing is of a kind whose possibility we cannot conceive, we must expect its reality to be demonstrated to us by facts.
1840
The whole mind is in action in the application of thought to an object.
17th century
[God] wants a pure soul, good and honest intentions. [...] it is in one's heart that all must dedicate a sanctuary to him.
circa 65 AD
[The condition of the luxury worker] will show [...] how much industry in the cities has advantages over country labor. The villages will therefore be deserted.
1776
Bronze cinerary urn with lid
ca. 500 BCE
Whatever affection one may feel [...] for others, it is not and cannot be disinterested; [...] the most generous friendship [...] is only a modification of self-love.
1751
Between different consciousnesses, exchanges comparable to the phenomena of endosmosis could be taking place at every moment.
1919
There is no essential difference between a wooden image and an imaginative image [...] The adoration of the sculpted or painted image [...] is but the external, physical manifestation of the inner, spiritual adoration.
1841
Most men feel more wounded by insults than by offensive actions, and find a mark of contempt harder to bear than actual harm.
100-120 AD
Marble table leg (trapezophoros) with reliefs of griffins
5th century BCE
Evil dwells in the soul of the criminal without being felt there. It is felt in the soul of the innocent afflicted person.
1942
Let us only win peace and not worry that it be poor: if we have war, nothing is enough; if we have peace, nothing will be lacking.
c. 1552-1553
Why do not all beings have a soul [...]?
384–322 BC
It is in the use of independence that she has drawn the courage to undergo its sacrifice without struggle or murmur when the time has come to impose it upon herself.
1835-1840
Fragment of a limestone naiskos (?)
ca. 5th century BCE
Prosperity [...] is but a fleeting state: it is a kind of game [...] where the most skillful is the one who knows when to quit while they're ahead.
1636
All the wisdom and discourse of the world resolves itself into this one point: to teach us not to be afraid to die.
1580
He who thinks of advancing his own interests will easily be suspected of having distorted justice; but he who is not guided by personal views is not liable to pronounce unjust judgments.
1263-1264
Joubert spent his life thinking, as others spend their life living. [...] He lived only in thought.
1926
A Woman with the Initials MCC
1773
The will is but a desire that is not fought, that has its object in its power, or at least believes it has [...].
1746
Alas! My dear Roderigo, [...] it is your wife who is coming for you.
1518-1527
There are those who mix in everywhere [...] the political reflections in which they delight, throwing themselves into all sorts of digressions.
1623
This kind of [intuitive] Knowledge is the clearest and most certain that human frailty is capable of.
1689
The Night-Hag Visiting Lapland Witches
1796
This regulation was as wise as it was bold: it repressed the ambition of a foreign court, and flattered the national clergy [...].
1769
[...] there exists in man something that keeps the profane at a distance [...]; the human organism conceals a sacred principle in its depths.
1912
The unity and simplicity of this concept would easily make one forget what a long series of obstacles had to be overcome to achieve it.
1663
The family is a school of despotism in which the virtues of despotism, but also its vices, are lavishly nourished.
1869
Venice from the Bacino di San Marco
ca. 1765–75