The producer can no longer survey the market at a glance, or even in thought; he can no longer picture its limits, since it is, so to speak, limitless.
1893
Such is the blessed condition of the intelligible world that in doing nothing it does great things, and in remaining within itself it produces important works.
c. 253-270 AD
Often, by wanting to keep everything, one loses everything, and by being unwilling to part with false customs [...] one gives enemies the opportunity to shake the good [...] traditions.
c. 1552-1553
A somewhat lofty soul loves to struggle against an evil fate, [...] and the fight pleases it even without the victory.
1746
Statuette of a woman
3rd–1st century BCE
The mechanical arts [...] are like so many two-edged swords that serve sometimes to do evil, sometimes to remedy it.
1620
If justice is indelible in the human heart, it has a reality in this world.
1943
The lure of profit has multiplied them too much, and [businesses] harm each other through competition.
1776
[The superstitious person] believes [...] he can speak as pertinently about a thing that, in his view, the greatest naturalist knows no better than he does.
1790
Bronze statuette of Minerva
2nd century CE
[...] true Christians are made to be slaves, [...] that one must not teach the catechism to children, because they do not have the spirit to believe in God.
1766
The mystery of the resurrection [...].
1841
It is impossible for us to see around our own corner: it is a hopeless curiosity that wants to know what other kinds of intellects and perspectives there might be.
1882
If he is a man, he is an animal; if he is a stone, he is not an animal; but he is a man, therefore he is not a stone.
c. 1270
Grainfields
mid- or late 1660s
There are then in the soul, it seems, false pleasures, which only ridiculously imitate the true ones [...].
c. 360 BC
One never manages to prove that the man represents the work and that the work represents the man.
1926
A difficulty [...] will perhaps vanish entirely with new meditations.
1661-1676
He was led to the theater, and all the children were brought from the schools to witness the most beautiful of spectacles, the punishment of a tyrant.
100-120 AD
Portrait of a Young Boy
1591
They are worlds in miniature, [...] fruitful simplicities; unities of substance, but virtually infinite, through the multitude of their modifications.
1702
Freedom [...] admits of degrees.
1889
Love me, for it is dreadful to be loved by no one.
1741-1784
Not daring to speak frankly of oneself indicates a lack of courage.
1580
Fragment of a limestone funerary stele with a disk and a crescent
2nd half of the 6th century BCE
A beautiful retreat in war brings as much honor as a proud attack.
1636
All silencing of discussion is an assumption of infallibility.
1859
If all objects strongly affect youth, it is because all are new to them.
1772
Observe yourselves accordingly when you act, and you will find to what School you belong.
c. 108 AD
Terracotta female head
late 3rd–2nd century BCE
Neither reed nor ink should trace thoughts [...]; for one gives a precise form to ideas, and the other, a color that strikes the eye.
3rd or 4th century AD
As long as [our judgments] are difficult and slow, we have a detailed consciousness of them, and as soon as they have been repeated often enough [...], they occur almost without our noticing.
1801
Just as Prometheus, having stolen fire from heaven, begins to build houses [...], so philosophy, having expanded to the dimensions of the world, turns toward the world of phenomena.
1841
It would require a genius stronger than that of Socrates [...]; for, since it did not save him from imprisonment or death, he has not much reason to boast of it.
1643-1649
A Spanish Garden
1871
The unlimited independence of the individual will cannot be a barrier against the vices that each of us carries within.
c. 350 BCE
Indeed, it is not necessary for a simile to extend to all parts of an object; it is enough that it is accurate from the chosen point of view.
86-82 BC
It would be unreasonable to believe that one could destroy in servitude the vices that servitude naturally and necessarily gives birth to.
1864-1866
I am convinced that impudence and obstinacy are the companions of error: men who go astray give free rein to passion, without ever remaining in that state of reasonable suspension, which alone can protect them from the grossest absurdities.
1751
Limestone statuette of a beardless male votary with a wreath of leaves
late 5th or early 4th century BCE
True liberty is to have the freedom to dispose of one's person, actions, and possessions [...] according to the laws one lives under.
1690
All the religions we see on earth show us nothing but a heap of impostures and reveries that equally revolt reason.
1766
It should not be difficult for a prudent prince [...] to inspire firmness in the inhabitants, and to maintain them in this disposition as long as they do not lack the means to feed and defend themselves.
1513
They announce, by their attire, that they know the things of heaven and earth [...]. They wear the costume, without knowing the thing itself.
4th century BC
Portrait of a Woman
1817
A very intelligent blind man could, with what he has heard about colors, compose a theory of them.
1819
Society has made man weaker, not only by taking away the right he had over his own strength, but especially by making it insufficient for him.
1762
One would often be mistaken if one always judged what others must feel by what one feels oneself.
1674-1675
The sick must look upon their bed as an altar where they continually offer to God the sacrifice of their life, to give it back to Him when He pleases.
1643-1662
The Nymph of Fontainebleau
1550