To see a million men serve miserably, with their necks under the yoke, not constrained by a greater force, but [...] enchanted and charmed by the name of one man alone.
c. 1552-1553
Sight resembles touch: it operates in the light by transporting itself, so to speak, to the object, without the medium experiencing any affection.
c. 253-270 AD
It is much easier for [God] to do the works He willed than it is for us to recount them.
1263-1264
...which brought a very notable inconvenience to those waiting on the route...
1662
Marble statue of the so-called Stephanos Athlete
late 1st century BCE or 1st century CE
It is necessary [...] to arrive little by little at the government of the country by the country.
1864-1866
Death in itself is not glorious; to die bravely is what is glorious.
63-64 AD
In becoming sociable and a slave, [man] becomes weak, fearful, and servile; and his soft and effeminate way of life completes the enervation of both his strength and his courage.
1755
The brain is an 'organ of pantomime.' [...] Cerebral phenomena are to mental life what the conductor's gestures are to the symphony: they outline its motor articulations [...].
1919
Bronze stamp
1st–2nd century CE
The more terrible the god, the more docile and submissive we are to his ministers.
1757
We are irritated by those who rejoice in our misfortune, or, generally, by those who remain calm in the face of our hardships.
329-323 BC
It would have been better to take as leader [...] the last of one's own, than the first of foreigners: this at least should be the thought of those who value nobility [...].
100-120 AD
We should envy others less for their happiness than for their misfortune.
1851
Wheat Fields
ca. 1670
The years [...] were leaving him with fewer laurels on his head than white hairs.
1926
If they drove a tyrant from the state, the causes of tyranny nonetheless remained. They only bought a new tyrant at the price of much blood.
1670
The most dissolute men [...] corrupt public morals less than those whose vices are allied with some virtues, and who are only partly wicked.
1623
One feels how much a good deed honors the giver, when there is so much glory in receiving.
46 BC
Bronze support in the form of a ram's head and foreleg
1st century BCE–1st century CE
The ideal rests on nothing if its roots are not grounded in reality.
1893
The greatest misfortune of a man of letters [...] is to be judged by fools.
1764
What profusion! what audacity! what insane splendor! Meanwhile the poor, hungry, naked, sick, [...] languishes before your eyes, covered in disgrace [...].
1746
Where there is no law, there is no freedom. For liberty is to be free from restraint and violence from others.
1690
Circus Sideshow (Parade de cirque)
1887–88
The ruin of [Fan] did not take my life. It is not certain that the prosperity of [Tch'ou] will preserve yours.
4th century BC
An attitude is one thing, an action is another. Every attitude is false and small; every action is beautiful and true.
1766
Every time they take up arms, [nations] destroy a stock of wealth that they would have put into circulation [...].
1776
The only way to advance the sciences is to separate them well, to first take each one apart as a whole, and only then to try to consider them in their union.
1793
Baron Alexander von Humboldt (1769–1859)
1859
If two individuals were perfectly similar [...] and indistinguishable in themselves, there would be no principle of individuation; and I would even dare to say that there would be no individual distinction [...] under this condition.
1704
Criticism will point out the author's errors, the public will mock them; that is all the punishment he deserves.
1772
I have had the greatest difficulty in the world keeping myself out of the hands of doctors, so as not to suffer from their ignorance, without even having been ill.
1643-1649
What then will you swear? Never to disobey God, never to reproach him, never to complain about what he gives you as your lot.
c. 108 AD
Bronze floral element
ca. 550–500 BCE
Whether it happened or not, in Rome or in Paris, to John or to Peter, it is always a turn of human capacity, of which I am usefully informed by this account.
1580
[The Communist Manifesto] has become the profession of faith for the majority of European socialists.
March 17, 1883
It is not possible to judge wrongly, just as it is not possible to feel wrongly.
1805
What is the peculiar character of the modern world? [...] It is that man is no longer born to the place he will occupy in life [...], but is free to use his faculties [...] to create for himself the fate that seems most desirable to him.
1869
Lead figure of a woman
late 7th–early 6th century BCE
[Disputes are] debates [...] between the infallible interpreters of the word of God, who [...] did not wish to speak too clearly, for fear that his dear Priests would have nothing to squabble about.
1768
'We recognize the principle of the decline of humanity, and consequently the necessity of its regeneration; we believe in the possibility of this regeneration [...].'
1896
Truly beautiful works of art offer the example of wholes in which independent factors converge, in a way impossible to understand, to constitute a unique beauty.
1943
When one has found the truth, one must stand firm in it; since curiosity is given to us only to lead us to discover it.
1674-1675
Madonna and Child with Saints Jerome and Francis
1495
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
The artist clearly understood the mission that was addressed only to him, to restore to myth its virile nature and to deliver music, to force it to speak.
1876
[The art of] persuading one is similar to [that of] persuading the many.
End of the 4th century BC
He delighted in the honors and pomps of the world, and valued the praise of men, which threw him into great prodigality.
1518-1527
Limestone lower left leg
4th or 3rd century BCE ?