Idea, image, feeling; in a book, everything must be prepared and brought forth.
1772
Source: On Man
Claude-Adrien Helvétius
Claude Adrien Helvétius (26 January 1715 – 26 December 1771) was a French philosopher, freemason and litterateur.
A true image in itself still displeases me when it is not in its place, when nothing leads to it or prepares it.
1772
Source: On Man
One does not recall often enough that, in good works, almost all beauties are local.
1772
Source: On Man
For [feelings] to make a strong impression on stage, they must be brought forth and prepared with art.
1772
Source: On Man
Lacking an exact conformity between my hero's situation and feelings, these feelings become false.
1772
Source: On Man
A new truth, almost always too steep for the common man, is at first perceived only by the smallest number among them.
1772
Source: On Man
If I want [a truth] to affect people generally, I must, in advance, prepare their minds [...]; I must raise them to it by degrees.
1772
Source: On Man
To the sharpness of the idea must also be joined the clarity of the expression. It is to this clarity that almost all the rules of style relate.
1772
Source: On Man
Few poets [...] know man; few among them have studied the various passions enough to always make them speak their own language.
1772
Source: On Man
Each of them [the passions], however, has its own [language].
1772
Source: On Man
Humanity [...] manages vanity, shows it the truth, but in the least offensive expressions.
1772
Source: On Man
Harshness speaks [the truth] bluntly; malignancy says it in the most humiliating way.
1772
Source: On Man
Pride commands imperiously; it is deaf to all representation; it wants to be obeyed without examination.
1772
Source: On Man
Reason is never but the last resort of love.
1772
Source: On Man
The deceiver borrows the language of friendship, and is recognized [...] by the difference one notices between the feeling he claims to be affected by and the one he ought to have.
1772
Source: On Man
In Europe [...] if all the precepts of education are contradictory, it is because public instruction is entrusted to two powers whose interests are opposed.
1772
Source: On Man
A prince is only truly strong through the strength of his nation. If it ceases to be respected, the prince ceases to be powerful.
1772
Source: On Man
The power of the priest is linked to the superstition and stupid credulity of the people. [...] the less enlightened they are, the more docile they are to his decisions.
1772
Source: On Man
The interest of the spiritual power is not tied to the interest of a nation, but to the interest of a sect.
1772
Source: On Man
Great talents and great virtues are almost unknown [...] wherever spiritual power is most feared.
1772
Source: On Man
To rise to the highest point of greatness, one [of the powers] must exalt the passions in man, and the other must destroy them.
1772
Source: On Man
[...] strong passions, directed towards the general good, serve [...] as the basis for the greatness [of a State].
1772
Source: On Man
If life is but an overnight stay, why take so much interest in the things of this world? A traveler does not repair the walls of the inn where he is to spend but one night.
1772
Source: On Man
It is probity [...] that both these powers preach; [...] but neither one nor the other can attach the same meaning to this word.
1772
Source: On Man
Our desires are our motors, and it is the strength of our desires that determines that of our vices and our virtues.
1772
Source: On Man
A man without desire and without need is without wit and without reason; no motive engages him to combine or to compare his ideas.
1772
Source: On Man
The mind is the child of desire and need. To demand enlightenment from a despot is to want an effect without a cause.
1772
Source: On Man
The nature of despotic governments is to weaken the movement of passions within man.
1772
Source: On Man
To wish to destroy passions in men is to wish to destroy action in them.
1772
Source: On Man
Does [the theologian] insult the passions? It is the pendulum mocking its spring, and the effect disowning its cause.
1772
Source: On Man
Passions lead us into error because they fix all our attention on one side of the object they present to us, and do not allow us to consider it from all its aspects.
1758
Source: On the Mind
[...] fortune is fickle, [...] the burden of misery is borne almost equally by the victor and the vanquished.
1758
Source: On the Mind
[...] the good of the subjects serves only as a pretext for warlike fury, and [...] it is pride that forges the weapons and unfurls the banners.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Not only do passions deceive us by often showing us objects where they do not exist, but they only let us consider certain facets of the objects they present.
1758
Source: On the Mind
[...] we most often perceive in things only what we wish to find there.
1758
Source: On the Mind
[...] on earth, as on the moon, different passions will always make us see either lovers or bell towers.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Illusion is a necessary effect of the passions, whose strength is almost always measured by the degree of blindness into which they plunge us.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Ah! treacherous one, [...] I see it, you no longer love me; you believe what you see more than what I tell you.
1758
Source: On the Mind
[This principle] is not only applicable to the passion of love, but to all passions. They all strike us with the deepest blindness.
1758
Source: On the Mind
[...] one ceases to be animated by a strong passion the very moment one ceases to be blind.
1758
Source: On the Mind
There is no century which, by some ridiculous affirmation or negation, does not provide laughter for the following century.
1758
Source: On the Mind
A past folly rarely enlightens people about their present folly.
1758
Source: On the Mind
[...] these same passions, which must be regarded as the seed of an infinity of errors, are also the source of our enlightenment.
1758
Source: On the Mind
If passions lead us astray, they alone give us the necessary strength to move forward.
1758
Source: On the Mind
[Passions] alone can tear us away from that inertia and laziness always ready to seize all the faculties of our soul.
1758
Source: On the Mind
To pass ever-just judgments, one would have to be free from all the passions that corrupt our judgment [...]: for this purpose, one would have to know everything.
1758
Source: On the Mind
One only truly has a sound mind in those fields upon which one has more or less meditated.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The sound mind is [...] most often only the art of reasoning methodically falsely.
1758
Source: On the Mind
In matters of religious truths, reason is powerless against two great missionaries: example and fear.
1758
Source: On the Mind
In every country, the prejudices of the great are the law of the small.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Only he is cited as a fool who is not a fool of the common foolishness.
1758
Source: On the Mind
One gladly mocks a foolishness from which one believes oneself exempt [...], one fears laughing at oneself under another's name.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The science of common things is the science of mediocre people; and sometimes the man of genius is, in this respect, grossly ignorant.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Genius illuminates a few acres of that immense night which surrounds mediocre minds; but it does not illuminate everything.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Ignorance and folly easily persuade themselves that they know everything [...]. The great man alone can be modest.
1758
Source: On the Mind
One must either run or at least walk in order to fall.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Certain minds do not have within them that principle of life and passion which produces equally great vices, great virtues, and great talents.
1758
Source: On the Mind
One serves one's country either by the innocence of one's morals [...] or by the enlightenment one spreads. Of these two ways [...], the latter [...] provides the most advantages to the public.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The man of genius, even if he has vices, is still more estimable than you. Indeed, one serves one's country [...] by the enlightenment one spreads there.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Gravity [...] is but a secret of the body to hide the defects of the mind.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The object of the arts is to please, and consequently to excite in us sensations which, without being painful, are lively and strong.
1772
Source: On Man
The beautiful is that which strikes us vividly.
1772
Source: On Man
If one wants novelty in an artist's work, it is because novelty produces a sensation of surprise, a vivid commotion.
1772
Source: On Man
What makes us demand [...] singular characters and new situations? The desire to be moved.
1772
Source: On Man
The habit of an impression dulls its vivacity. [...] The same beauty, in the long run, ceases to be so for me.
1772
Source: On Man
The duration of the same sensation makes us insensitive to it in the long run; hence this inconstancy and this love of novelty common to all men [...].
1772
Source: On Man
If all objects strongly affect youth, it is because all are new to them.
1772
Source: On Man
[...] the sureness of taste perhaps supposes a certain difficulty in being moved.
1772
Source: On Man
The reader would wish that every verse, every line, every word, would excite a sensation in him.
1772
Source: On Man
It is [...] by its greater or lesser force that we distinguish the beautiful from the sublime.
1772
Source: On Man
Does one judge according to one's sensations [...]? The judgments are always right. Does one judge according to one's prejudices, that is to say, according to others? The judgments are always false.
1772
Source: On Man
[...] one esteems on hearsay even the work that bores us.
1772
Source: On Man
Envy [...] forbids admiring a contemporary [...]. To humiliate the living, what praise is lavished on the dead!
1772
Source: On Man
The most despised work is not the work full of flaws, but the work void of beauty; [...] it excites no vivid sensations in the reader.
1772
Source: On Man
The more strongly one is moved, the happier one is, provided the emotion is not painful.
1772
Source: On Man
The esteem or contempt attached to the same kinds of intellect is, among different peoples, always the effect of the different form of their government, and [...] of the diversity of their interests.
1758
Source: On the Mind
One does not take the trouble to persuade when one can command.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The spirit of commerce [...] brings with it a taste for luxury and softness, [and] must each day diminish [...] the esteem for the art of war, and even for courage.
1758
Source: On the Mind
It is impossible not to hold merit in high regard in a country where every citizen has a share in the management of general affairs.
1758
Source: On the Mind
In Spain, they ask: Is he a grandee of the first class? in Germany, Can he enter the chapters? in France, Is he in favor at court? in Holland, How much gold does he have? in England, What kind of man is he?
1758
Source: On the Mind
Great talents are always suspect to unjust governments.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Riches and dignities are [...] the only goods visible to all eyes, the only ones reputed to be true goods, and are universally desired.
1758
Source: On the Mind
How many wealthy people [...] congratulate themselves in a superbly modest tone for having, for lack of wit, purchased, as they say, common sense.
1758
Source: On the Mind
To make a fortune, [...] is not the man of wit forced to waste in the antechamber of a patron time that should be spent in stubborn studies?
1758
Source: On the Mind
Secretly jealous of the reputation of people of merit, the man in power receives them in his home less out of taste than for show, solely to demonstrate that he has one of everything in his house.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Whoever is born to illuminate his century is always on his guard against the great.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Among certain peoples, everything must yield to the interest of laziness.
1758
Source: On the Mind
There are only two ways to guard against [it]. The first is to perfect the education of women [...]. The second [...], would be to rid women of their remaining modesty.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Little ill is said of those who do not deserve praise.
1758
Source: On the Mind
One must oneself deserve much praise to patiently bear the praise that is given to another.
1758
Source: On the Mind
A people will never place the shackles of reason on its vanity.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Every people will always rank among the gifts of nature the virtues it derives from the form of its government.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Interest is the sole dispenser of the esteem or contempt that nations have for their different morals, customs, and ways of thinking.
1758
Source: On the Mind
What is the use of endlessly repeating that it is beautiful to die for one's country? An aphorism does not make a hero.
1758
Source: On the Mind
It is passions, and not moral maxims, that form courageous men.
1758
Source: On the Mind
[...] the legislator shapes heroes, geniuses, and virtuous people at will.
1758
Source: On the Mind
If citizens could not achieve their private happiness without doing public good, then only fools would be vicious.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Public interest [...] not always being aligned with the interest of the most powerful, the latter [...] must have effectively opposed the progress of morality.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The power [of tyrants] is founded only on human ignorance and imbecility.
1758
Source: On the Mind
It is ignorance which, even more barbarous than interest, has poured the most calamities upon the earth.
1758
Source: On the Mind
If audacious and powerful crime so often chains justice and virtue, it is only with the help of ignorance.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The passion of patriotism, a passion so desirable, so virtuous and so estimable in a citizen, is [...] absolutely exclusive of universal love.
1758
Source: On the Mind
It is therefore only through good laws that one can form virtuous men.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The sensible man agrees that nature [...] is nothing other than our first habit.
1758
Source: On the Mind
If by education we mean everything that serves our instruction, [...] no one receives the same education, because everyone has for tutors [...] chance [...].
1758
Source: On the Mind
Man is sensitive to physical pleasure and pain; he flees one and seeks the other; [...] it is to this constant flight and pursuit that we give the name of self-love.
1772
Source: On Man
[Self-love], an immediate effect of physical sensibility and common to all, is inseparable from man.
1772
Source: On Man
We owe to [self-love] all our desires, all our passions: they are but the application of this feeling to this or that object.
1772
Source: On Man
It is to [self-love] [...] that we must attribute the astonishing diversity of passions and characters.
1772
Source: On Man
Self-love makes us entirely what we are.
1772
Source: On Man
Why are we so eager for honors and dignities? It is because we love ourselves, [...] desire our own happiness, and consequently the power to procure it.
1772
Source: On Man
The love of power is necessarily linked in man to the love of himself.
1772
Source: On Man
Everyone wants to command, because everyone would like to increase their own felicity.
1772
Source: On Man
The love of power, founded on the love of happiness, is the common object of all our desires.
1772
Source: On Man
Riches, honors, glory, justice, virtue [...] are within us nothing but the love of power, disguised under these different names.
1772
Source: On Man
The intoxication of a high position makes [the leader] forget that he and his posterity may be the first victims of the power he builds.
1772
Source: On Man
The desire for power is general; [...] if all men do not expose themselves to the same dangers, it is because the love of self-preservation is in balance with the love of power.
1772
Source: On Man
Everything in us is an artificial passion, with the exception of physical needs, pains, and pleasures.
1772
Source: On Man
Progress [...] depends [...] on the skill of the teacher, their method [...], and finally on the more or less keen taste that the student acquires for their instrument.
1772
Source: On Man
Do you want to train a painter? From the moment they can hold a pencil, you put it in their hand.
1772
Source: On Man
Praise given at the right moment [...] is sometimes enough to awaken [...] the love of glory, and to endow one with that persistence of attention which produces great talents.
1772
Source: On Man
All can [...] love glory, at least in countries where that glory represents some real pleasure.
1772
Source: On Man
Chance [...] always plays a part in the making of illustrious men.
1772
Source: On Man
What an excellent education can do is to increase the number of geniuses in a nation; it is to inoculate [...] the rest of the citizens with common sense.
1772
Source: On Man
To bring [instruction] to perfection, it is only a matter [...] of simplifying teaching methods [...] and [...] of increasing the power of emulation.
1772
Source: On Man
The moral part of education is undoubtedly the most important and the most neglected part.
1772
Source: On Man
What do they learn in college [...]? To write Latin verses. How much time is devoted there to the study of [...] morality? Barely a month.
1772
Source: On Man
Should we be surprised, then, to find so few virtuous men, so few men instructed in their duties to society?
1772
Source: On Man
The maxims of [morality] must [...] relate to a simple principle from which, as in geometry, an infinity of secondary principles can be deduced.
1772
Source: On Man
Morality is not yet a science; for one will not honor with this name a jumble of incoherent and contradictory precepts.
1772
Source: On Man
In a state of idleness, there are no indifferent sensations; curiosity is awakened, [...] one wants to know the cause.
1772
Source: On Man
The devotion of a mother, the death of Cromwell, the theft of a deer, the exclamation of an old man, and the beauty of a woman, have in different fields given five illustrious men to Europe.
1772
Source: On Man
Genius [...] can only be the product of a strong and focused attention on an art or a science.
1772
Source: On Man
Are we born without ideas? We are also born without taste. One can therefore regard them as acquisitions due to the situations in which one finds oneself.
1772
Source: On Man
Genius is therefore the distant product of events or chances.
1772
Source: On Man
A dupe of his own eloquence, [...] [man] renounces the title of philosopher, and his errors become the consequences of his first success.
1772
Source: On Man
All of a man's ideas, all his glory and his misfortunes, are often chained by the invisible power of a first event.
1772
Source: On Man
In morals as in physics, only the grand strikes us. We always suppose great causes for great effects.
1772
Source: On Man
How many revolutions executed or prevented, wars ignited or extinguished, by the intrigues of a priest, a woman, or a minister!
1772
Source: On Man
The rise or fall [of citizens], their happiness or their misfortune, are the product of a certain confluence of circumstances and an infinity of unforeseen chances.
1772
Source: On Man
I compare the small accidents that prepare the great events of our lives to [...] a root which, creeping [...] into the cracks of a rock, grows there to one day shatter it.
1772
Source: On Man
Chance has and therefore will always have a part in our education, and especially in that of men of genius.
1772
Source: On Man
To increase the number [of men of genius] in a nation, let us observe the means by which chance inspires men with the desire to distinguish themselves.
1772
Source: On Man
Man's moral education is now left almost entirely to chance. To perfect it, its plan should be directed towards public utility.
1772
Source: On Man
Perfect probity is never the lot of stupidity; probity without enlightenment is at most a probity of intention, for which the public has [...] no regard.
1758
Source: On the Mind
To be honest, one must therefore join the nobility of the soul to the enlightenment of the mind.
1758
Source: On the Mind
[Public utility] is the principle of all human virtues, and the foundation of all legislation.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Everything becomes legitimate and even virtuous for the public good.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Most of those who rage furiously against the domestic vices of an illustrious man prove less their love for the public good than their envy of his talents.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Nothing appears great on earth to one who contemplates it from a high point of view.
1758
Source: On the Mind
There is no debt more faithfully discharged than contempt.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Pride is the seed of so many virtues and talents that one must neither hope to destroy it, nor even attempt to weaken it, but only to direct it towards honest things.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The justice of our judgments and actions is never anything but the happy coincidence of our interest with the public interest.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Is there any man of wit who, if he moves in different societies, does not see himself successively treated as a fool, a wise man, pleasant, boring, stupid, and witty.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Personal interest is, in every society, the sole appraiser of the merit of things and people.
1758
Source: On the Mind
To please in society, one must not delve deeply into any matter, but flit from subject to subject [...] and consequently give one's mind more surface than depth.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Truth is only perceived and generated in the fermentation of contrary opinions.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The public knows and esteems only merit proven by facts.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Men are what they must be; that all hatred against them is unjust; that a fool bears foolishness, as a wild tree bears bitter fruit; that to insult him is to reproach the oak for bearing acorns rather than olives.
1758
Source: On the Mind
An individual can be moderate in his desires, be content with what he possesses; a body is always ambitious.
1772
Source: On Man
The desire of the clergy has always been to be powerful and rich. By what means did it manage to satisfy this? Through the sale of fear and hope.
1772
Source: On Man
The sinner always becomes the slave of the priest; it is the multiplication of sins that favors the trade in indulgences [...] and increases the power and wealth of the clergy.
1772
Source: On Man
It was necessary to create sins that honest people could commit.
1772
Source: On Man
The violation of ritual law, if it were possible, was [...] more severely punished than the most abominable crimes.
1772
Source: On Man
From the moment the priests condemned Socrates, genius, virtue, and kings themselves trembled before the priesthood.
1772
Source: On Man
When man is forced to extinguish the light of reason within himself, then, without knowledge of right or wrong, it is the priest whom he consults.
1772
Source: On Man
Natural law is nothing other than reason itself.
1772
Source: On Man
[Natural law] is the canvas of all religions; but the priest has embroidered so many mysteries upon this canvas that the embroidery has entirely covered the background.
1772
Source: On Man
Whoever reads history sees the virtue of peoples diminish in proportion as their superstition increases.
1772
Source: On Man
The interest of priests is not that the citizen acts well, but that he does not think.
1772
Source: On Man
An educated, rich, and superstition-free people is, in the eyes of the priest, a people without morals.
1772
Source: On Man
More sins, more expiations, more offerings, the more wealth and power the priesthood acquires. What is the interest of the church? To multiply vices.
1772
Source: On Man
Truth can withstand ridicule; [...] it is its touchstone. To agree that a religion cannot bear ridicule would be to admit its falsehood.
1772
Source: On Man
It matters little to us [...] that your people are happy and feared, but it matters a great deal that the priesthood is rich and powerful.
1772
Source: On Man
In all fields, it is the scarcity of rewards that produces the scarcity of talents.
1772
Source: On Man
Nature's intention is not [...] that the body should be strengthened before the mind is exercised, but that the mind should be exercised as the body is strengthened.
1772
Source: On Man
In this regard, it is with the grown man as with the child; both reason poorly on what they do not understand.
1772
Source: On Man
The mind is like the body; one does not make the one attentive and the other supple except through continual exercise. Attention becomes easy only through habit.
1772
Source: On Man
The safest course is to accustom children early to the fatigue of attention: this habit is the most real advantage one draws [...] from the best studies.
1772
Source: On Man
But what can be done to make children attentive? Let them have an interest in being so.
1772
Source: On Man
Fear breeds attention.
1772
Source: On Man
[It should be that] experience be the only, or at least the first, of masters, and that in every science the disciple should always rise from simple sensations to the most complex ideas.
1772
Source: On Man
To repeat that childhood and youth are without judgment is the talk of old men in a comedy.
1772
Source: On Man
Youth reflects less than old age, because it feels more, because all objects, being new to it, make a stronger impression upon it.
1772
Source: On Man
If the strength of its sensations distracts [it] from meditation, their vividness engraves more deeply in its memory the objects that some interest must one day make it compare.
1772
Source: On Man
To believe without any proof that the stars influence the fate and character of men is foolishness...
1772
Source: On Man
The masters, not knowing how to make [the disciples] reason, have an interest in declaring them incapable of it.
1772
Source: On Man
All commonly well-organized men have an equal aptitude for intelligence.
1772
Source: On Man
All our ideas come to us through the senses.
1772
Source: On Man
The inequality of minds is the effect of a known cause, and this cause is the difference in education.
1772
Source: On Man
An opinion [...] is all the more generally adopted because it favors human laziness and spares it the trouble of useless research.
1772
Source: On Man
In man, everything is physical sensation.
1772
Source: On Man
If a known cause accounts for a fact, why attribute it to an unknown cause, to an occult quality [...]?
1772
Source: On Man
All the operations of the mind are reduced to feeling.
1772
Source: On Man
Of a hundred men, there are more than ninety who are what they are, good or bad, useful or harmful to society, because of the instruction they have received.
1772
Source: On Man
It is on education that the great difference observed between them depends.
1772
Source: On Man
The smallest and most imperceptible impressions received in our childhood have very important and long-lasting consequences.
1772
Source: On Man
[The talent for thinking] is as natural to man as flight to birds, running to horses, and ferocity to wild beasts.
1772
Source: On Man
The life of the soul is in its activity and its industry; which has caused it to be attributed a celestial origin.
1772
Source: On Man
Dull minds and those inept at the sciences are no more in the order of nature than monsters and extraordinary phenomena.
1772
Source: On Man
It is evident that it is not nature, but our own negligence, that is to blame.
1772
Source: On Man
It is [...] with the same ease that one can turn the minds of children in whatever direction one wishes.
1772
Source: On Man
There is no country where wealth settles [...]. Like the seas [...], wealth, after bringing abundance and luxury to certain nations, withdraws from them to spread to other lands.
1772
Source: On Man
A people enriched by its trade and industry impoverishes its neighbors, and in the long run makes them unable to buy its goods.
1772
Source: On Man
In a rich nation, as money [...] gradually multiplies, commodities and labor become more expensive.
1772
Source: On Man
The opulent nation, unable to supply its commodities and goods at the price of a poor nation, must see its money gradually pass into the hands of the latter.
1772
Source: On Man
Wealth, in withdrawing from a country where it has stayed, almost always deposits there the mire of baseness and despotism.
1772
Source: On Man
A rich nation that becomes impoverished passes rapidly from decay to its entire destruction.
1772
Source: On Man
Does a nation fall from wealth into poverty? That nation awaits nothing more than a conqueror and chains.
1772
Source: On Man
In the body politic, as in the human body, there must be a soul, a spirit, that enlivens it and sets it in motion.
1772
Source: On Man
The ebb and flow of money are, in the moral realm, the effect of causes as constant, as necessary, and as powerful as the ebb and flow of the seas are in the physical realm.
1772
Source: On Man
One only acquires in order to spend.
1772
Source: On Man
The love of superfluities stirs in the great the thirst for gold and the desire for power: they will want to command their fellow citizens as despots.
1772
Source: On Man
Following wealth, arbitrary power, gradually introducing itself among a people, will corrupt their morals and debase them.
1772
Source: On Man
The same desire for gain which at first constituted [a nation's] strength and power thus becomes the cause of its ruin.
1772
Source: On Man
The principle of life which, developing in a majestic oak, raises its stem, [...] and makes it reign over the forests, is the principle of its decay.
1772
Source: On Man
The virtues of poverty in a nation are boldness, pride, good faith, constancy, and finally a kind of noble ferocity.
1772
Source: On Man
Love for men and for truth made me compose this work. Let them know themselves [...], they will be happy and virtuous.
1772
Source: On Man
It is now only in forbidden books that one finds the truth: lies are told in the others.
1772
Source: On Man
Most authors are in their writings what people of the world are in conversation: solely occupied with pleasing [...].
1772
Source: On Man
Any writer who desires the favor of the powerful [...] must adopt the spirit of the day, be nothing by himself, everything by others.
1772
Source: On Man
Original books are sown here and there in the night of time, like suns in the deserts of space, to illuminate the darkness.
1772
Source: On Man
[Original books] mark an epoch in the history of the human mind, and it is from their principles that one rises to new discoveries.
1772
Source: On Man
The love of truth is the most favorable disposition for finding it.
1772
Source: On Man
If this book is bad, it is because I am a fool, and not because I am a rogue: few others can give this testimony of themselves.
1772
Source: On Man
There are moments in every nation when the word prudent is synonymous with vile, when only the servilely written work is cited as wisely thought.
1772
Source: On Man
The nature of despotism is to stifle thought in the mind, and virtue in the soul.
1772
Source: On Man
In every nation there are moments when the citizens, uncertain of the side they should take, [...] experience a thirst for instruction.
1772
Source: On Man
Let a good work appear at that moment, it can bring about happy reforms; but, that moment passed, the citizens [...] are invincibly drawn towards ignorance.
1772
Source: On Man
Then minds are the hardened earth; the water of truth falls on it, flows, but without fertilizing it.
1772
Source: On Man
Happiness, like the sciences, is, they say, a traveler on the earth.
1772
Source: On Man
One only has heartfelt esteem for one's equals.
1772
Source: On Man
If all moral truth is but a means to increase or ensure the happiness of the greatest number, [...] there is no moral truth whose publication is not desirable.
1772
Source: On Man
There are [...] only two forms of government, one good, the other bad.
1772
Source: On Man
To say that one cannot change laws harmful to the nation [...] is to say that one cannot change a regimen contrary to one's health.
1772
Source: On Man
Any government [...] can have no other object than the happiness of the greatest number of its citizens.
1772
Source: On Man
Only he should oppose any reform useful to the state who founds his greatness on the debasement of his compatriots.
1772
Source: On Man
One does not annihilate a science when one perfects it, and [...] one does not destroy a government when one reforms it.
1772
Source: On Man
An enlightened sovereign never regarded arbitrary power [...] as the real constitution of a state.
1772
Source: On Man
To honor a cruel despotism [with the title of government] is to give the name of government to a confederation of thieves.
1772
Source: On Man
Every act of arbitrary power is unjust.
1772
Source: On Man
A power acquired and maintained by force is a power that force has the right to repel.
1772
Source: On Man
There is only one thing truly contrary to any kind of constitution: it is the misfortune of the people.
1772
Source: On Man
No society [...] has ever given or could ever give into the hands of one man the power to dispose at will of the property, life, and liberty of its citizens.
1772
Source: On Man
Any people groaning under the yoke of arbitrary power has the right to shake it off.
1772
Source: On Man
Sacred laws are those that conform to the public interest.
1772
Source: On Man
Any law contrary [to the public interest] is not a law, it is a legal abuse.
1772
Source: On Man
In every century, women are not won over by the same charms; hence so many different depictions of love.
1772
Source: On Man
The novel is finished when the novelist has put them in the same bed.
1772
Source: On Man
If these kinds of works differ from one another, it is only in the variety of means employed [...] to make his mistress accept this somewhat wild phrase: Me want to sleep with you.
1772
Source: On Man
The tone of novels changes according to the century, the government under which the novelist writes, and the degree of idleness of its hero.
1772
Source: On Man
In a busy nation, little importance is placed on love. It is fickle, as short-lived as the rose.
1772
Source: On Man
Among an idle people, love becomes a business; it is more constant.
1772
Source: On Man
What can boredom and idleness not do to morals!
1772
Source: On Man
The two spouses grow bitter and detest each other, because they are idle, bored, and unhappy.
1772
Source: On Man
[...] spouses love each other because they are busy, because they are mutually useful to each other [...].
1772
Source: On Man
Idleness, often the mother of vices, is always the mother of boredom.
1772
Source: On Man
[...] it is even in religion that one seeks a remedy for this boredom.
1772
Source: On Man
Marriage [...] often presents but the picture of two unfortunates united to bring about their mutual unhappiness.
1772
Source: On Man
The pursuit of pleasure is permitted. Why deprive oneself of it when these pleasures do no harm to society?
1772
Source: On Man
The heroes of a comedy or a tragedy [...] make the same request of her, and differ only in the way they express it.
1772
Source: On Man
The name of genius that the public gives to such different men therefore supposes a common quality that characterizes genius in them.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The word genius [...] always supposes invention; and this quality is the only one that belongs to all different geniuses.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Chance has [...] a greater part than one imagines in the success of great men, since it provides them with the subjects [...] they address.
1758
Source: On the Mind
...the law of continuity is always exactly observed, and [...] there are no leaps in nature.
1758
Source: On the Mind
It is impossible for a great man not to be always heralded by another great man.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The works of genius are like [...] those superb monuments [...] which, executed by several generations [...], bear the name of the one who finishes them.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Chance [...] does nothing except in favor of those animated by a keen desire for glory.
1758
Source: On the Mind
We owe [...] that boldness of genius which summons to the tribunal of reason the opinions, prejudices, and errors consecrated by time.
1758
Source: On the Mind
One science is enough to fill the entire capacity of a soul: thus there is not and cannot be a universal genius.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The length of the necessary meditations [...] compared to the short span of life, demonstrates the impossibility of excelling in several genres.
1758
Source: On the Mind
In the instructive genre, beauty, elegance of diction [...] are but a secondary merit.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The man of genius is therefore partly the work of chance.
1758
Source: On the Mind
...the knowledge of small things almost always supposes ignorance of great ones.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Any man who leads more or less the life of everyone has only the ideas of everyone; such a man does not rise above mediocrity.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Any man who concentrates on study [...] lives isolated in the midst of the world. He is always himself, and almost never others; he must therefore almost always appear ridiculous to them.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Every man who is consulted always believes his advice is dictated by friendship. [...] we love few people, and yet we want to advise everyone.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Where does this mania for giving advice come from? From our vanity.
1758
Source: On the Mind
More concerned with the interest of our vanity than with the interest of the one asking for advice, [...] our counsels have been nothing but our own eulogy.
1758
Source: On the Mind
When it comes to advice, it is always oneself that one proposes as a model.
1758
Source: On the Mind
It seems to me I hear a doctor say to his patient: Sir, do not have a fever.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Any feeling one no longer experiences is a feeling whose existence one no longer admits.
1758
Source: On the Mind
He who considers the ardor with which everyone proposes himself as a model thinks he sees swimmers [...] crying out to one another: It is I whom you must follow.
1758
Source: On the Mind
If the quality of advice depends on an exact knowledge of the feeling by which a man is affected, who can better advise oneself than oneself?
1758
Source: On the Mind
Who knows if, once character is formed and habits are made, each person does not conduct himself in the best possible way, even when he appears most mad?
1758
Source: On the Mind
By abandoning oneself to one's character, one at least spares oneself the useless efforts made to resist it.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The art of making [advice] palatable is perhaps, among men, the least perfected art.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Pride gives [advice], pride resists it: it is the anvil that repels the hammer.
1758
Source: On the Mind
One argues about what one knows, one makes definitive judgments about what one ignores.
1758
Source: On the Mind
From the artisan to the princes, everyone loves praise, and consequently, skillful flattery.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Uncertain people [...] trust more in foolishness that decides with a firm tone than in wisdom that speaks with hesitation.
1758
Source: On the Mind
A monarch's palace is not modeled on the palace of the universe, nor are the chords of our music on that of the celestial bodies.
1772
Source: On Man
In almost every other genre, the perfection of works consists in an embellished imitation of this same nature.
1772
Source: On Man
In what way do the great poets imitate nature? By always making their characters speak in accordance with the passion that animates them.
1772
Source: On Man
All our ideas come to us through our senses. We compose only from what we see.
1772
Source: On Man
How can one imagine something outside of nature? And [...] what means are there to transmit its idea to others?
1772
Source: On Man
What is meant by a new composition is, properly speaking, only a new assembly of already known objects.
1772
Source: On Man
A new assembly is enough to astonish the imagination and to excite impressions all the more vivid for being new.
1772
Source: On Man
Of what was Apelles's Venus composed? Of the beauties scattered across the bodies of the most beautiful girls of Greece.
1772
Source: On Man
It is thus that poetry embellishes nature, and that, from the decomposition of already known objects, it recomposes beings and pictures whose novelty excites surprise.
1772
Source: On Man
What is the fairy whose power allows us to metamorphose, to thus recompose objects [...]? This fairy is the power of abstraction.
1772
Source: On Man
In the theater, the hero must always speak in accordance with his character and his position.
1772
Source: On Man
The poet must embellish [nature] by gathering, in a half-hour conversation, all the character traits scattered throughout his hero's entire life.
1772
Source: On Man
To paint his miser, perhaps Molière drew upon all the misers of his century, just as Phidias drew upon all strong men to model their Hercules.
1772
Source: On Man
In free countries, governed by wise laws, no man has the power to impoverish his nation to enrich a few individuals.
1772
Source: On Man
Even in a free country, not all citizens enjoy the same fortune. The concentration of wealth happens more slowly there; but eventually, it happens.
1772
Source: On Man
It is necessary that the most industrious earns more, that the most frugal saves more, and that with wealth already acquired, one acquires new wealth.
1772
Source: On Man
In every kind of commerce, it is money that attracts money.
1772
Source: On Man
The unequal distribution [of wealth] is therefore a necessary consequence of its introduction into a state.
1772
Source: On Man
In a free country, the concentration of national wealth into a few hands happens slowly: it is the work of centuries.
1772
Source: On Man
As [the concentration of wealth] occurs, the government tends toward arbitrary power, and consequently toward its dissolution.
1772
Source: On Man
The republican state is the virile age of an empire; despotism is its old age.
1772
Source: On Man
Have the rich bribed a part of the nation? With that part, they subject the other to aristocratic or monarchical despotism.
1772
Source: On Man
Are new laws proposed [...]? All are in favor of the rich and the great, none in favor of the people.
1772
Source: On Man
The spirit of legislation becomes corrupt, and its corruption heralds the fall of the state.
1772
Source: On Man
It is to contradiction, and consequently to the freedom of the press, that the sciences [...] owe their perfection.
1772
Source: On Man
Take away [the freedom of the press], and see how many errors, consecrated by time, will be cited as indisputable axioms!
1772
Source: On Man
Do we want to be sure of the truth of our opinions? We must promulgate them.
1772
Source: On Man
It is on the touchstone of contradiction that [opinions] must be tested.
1772
Source: On Man
The magistrate who restricts [the press] opposes the perfection of morality and politics; he sins against his nation.
1772
Source: On Man
The ruler owes the nations truth as something useful, and freedom of the press as a means of discovering it.
1772
Source: On Man
Wherever [freedom of the press] is forbidden, ignorance, like a deep night, spreads over all minds.
1772
Source: On Man
If it is always in the public interest to know the truth, it is not always in the private interest to speak it.
1772
Source: On Man
Most governments exhort the citizen to search for [truth]; but almost all of them punish him for its discovery.
1772
Source: On Man
Few men long brave the hatred of the powerful out of pure love for humanity and truth.
1772
Source: On Man
The revelation of truth can only be odious to those impostors who present the enlightened people as seditious, and the stupefied people as docile.
1772
Source: On Man
Every educated nation is deaf to the vain declamations of fanaticism, and [...] injustice revolts it.
1772
Source: On Man
It is when I am stripped of [...] my life and my liberty [...] that the slave takes up arms against the master.
1772
Source: On Man
Truth has no enemies but the enemies of the public good themselves: only the wicked oppose its promulgation.
1772
Source: On Man
[Regarding religion], if it is true, it can withstand the test of discussion.
1772
Source: On Man
We argue every day about what should be called Wit: everyone has their say; no one attaches the same ideas to this word, and everyone speaks without understanding one another.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Memory is nothing other than a continued, but weakened, sensation.
1758
Source: On the Mind
If nature, instead of flexible hands and fingers, had ended our wrists with a horse's hoof, who doubts that men, without arts, without dwellings, [...] would still be wandering in the forests like fugitive herds?
1758
Source: On the Mind
It is evident that to remember is to feel.
1758
Source: On the Mind
All the operations of the mind are reduced to judging.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Passions lead us into error because they fix all our attention on one side of the object they present to us, and do not allow us to consider it from all its angles.
1758
Source: On the Mind
We most often perceive in things only what we wish to find in them.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Illusion is a necessary effect of the passions, the strength of which is almost always measured by the degree of blindness into which they plunge us.
1758
Source: On the Mind
These same passions, which must be regarded as the seed of an infinity of errors, are also the source of our enlightenment. If they lead us astray, they alone give us the necessary strength to move forward.
1758
Source: On the Mind
No one being sufficiently wary of their own ignorance, we too easily believe that what we see in an object is all that can be seen in it.
1758
Source: On the Mind
To love people, one must expect little from them: to see their faults without bitterness, one must get used to forgiving them [...].
1758
Source: On the Mind
If the physical universe is subject to the laws of motion, the moral universe is no less subject to that of interest.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Interest is on earth the powerful enchanter that changes the form of all objects in the eyes of all creatures.
1758
Source: On the Mind
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
Source: On the Mind
Any idea too foreign to our way of seeing and feeling always seems ridiculous to us.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Is the spirit of an age unfavorable to the undertakings of the priesthood? [...] the church sheds its ferocity, moderates its zeal; it loudly avows the independence of the prince. But is this avowal sincere?
1772
Source: On Man
The proof that by remaining silent the church does not abandon its claims is that it always teaches the same doctrine in Rome.
1772
Source: On Man
[The maxims of the clergy] prove less its attachment to sovereigns than its indifference and contempt for the happiness of men and nations.
1772
Source: On Man
What does the tyranny of evil kings matter to the church, as long as it shares their power?
1772
Source: On Man
The church says to the prince: 'Be my slave, [...] inspire in the people the fear of the priest, let them wallow in ignorance and stupidity; at this price I give you unlimited empire over your subjects: you can be a tyrant.'
1772
Source: On Man
A deaf enemy of temporal power, the priesthood, according to the times and the character of kings, humors them or insults them.
1772
Source: On Man
Such is the protocol of every enlightened prince: 'From God I hold my life, from the Danes my kingdom, [...] from your predecessors the faith, which I hereby return to you, if you do not grant my request.'
1772
Source: On Man
If one defies it [the court of Rome], one has nothing to fear from it.
1772
Source: On Man
Priests [...] are pusillanimous: [...] Imperious with those who fear them, they are cowardly with those who resist them.
1772
Source: On Man
An immortal body must never despair of its credit: as long as it exists, it has lost nothing.
1772
Source: On Man
To recover its former power, it need only watch for the opportunity, seize it, and march constantly towards its goal. The rest is the work of time.
1772
Source: On Man
One who enjoys immense wealth, like the clergy, can wait patiently.
1772
Source: On Man
There [...] still remains the resource of fanaticism against any prince timid enough not to dare establish the law of tolerance.
1772
Source: On Man
If the church sometimes forbade the laity from murdering the prince, it always permitted it to itself.
1772
Source: On Man
Wherever several religions [...] are tolerated, their zeal loses its acrimony every day. There are few fanatics where full tolerance is established.
1772
Source: On Man
Boredom was born one day of uniformity.
1772
Source: On Man
Monotonous sensations soon cease to make a vivid and pleasant impression on us.
1772
Source: On Man
There are no beautiful objects whose contemplation does not weary us in the long run.
1772
Source: On Man
A pretty woman is, for a young lover, an object even more beautiful than the sun. How many lovers, in the long run, cry out similarly, I have seen my mistress so much!
1772
Source: On Man
The hatred of boredom, the need for pleasant sensations, makes us constantly wish for new ones.
1772
Source: On Man
Ideas that are difficult to grasp are never keenly felt.
1772
Source: On Man
A plan for a work [...] that is too complicated [...] excites in us only a dull and weak impression.
1772
Source: On Man
Too many sensations at once create confusion: their multiplicity destroys their effect.
1772
Source: On Man
Of equal size, the most striking building is the one whose whole my eye easily grasps.
1772
Source: On Man
To make a great effect, one must [...] always present clear and distinct ideas.
1772
Source: On Man
It is doubtless pleasant [...] to find one's mistress at a rendezvous; but when she is no longer new, it is even more pleasant to go there and not find her.
1772
Source: On Man
[An author who], poorly unraveling a painful plot, turns an entertainment into a fatigue for me.
1772
Source: On Man
Justice is the preserver of the life and liberty of citizens.
1772
Source: On Man
Everyone [...] loves justice in others, and wants them to be just towards them.
1772
Source: On Man
Do we love justice for justice's sake, or for the consideration it brings?
1772
Source: On Man
Man so often does not know himself...
1772
Source: On Man
We perceive so much contradiction between his conduct and his words that, to know him, it is in his actions [...] that one must study him.
1772
Source: On Man
In morality, as in religion, there are few virtuous people, and many hypocrites.
1772
Source: On Man
A thousand people adorn themselves with feelings they neither have nor can have.
1772
Source: On Man
If we compare their conduct with their words, we see in them only scoundrels who want to make dupes.
1772
Source: On Man
One must generally be wary of the integrity of anyone who displays overly austere morals [...].
1772
Source: On Man
There are some who show themselves to be truly virtuous the moment the curtain rises and they are about to play a great role on the world's stage.
1772
Source: On Man
[...] but, when unadorned, how many of them maintain the same honesty, and are always just?
1772
Source: On Man
Present power and pleasure are often destructive of future pleasure and power.
1772
Source: On Man
If a prince manages to turn his subjects into automatons, he will be powerful at home, weak abroad, the tyrant of his subjects, and the scorn of his neighbors.
1772
Source: On Man
From the moment the strong has spoken, the weak falls silent, becomes brutish, and ceases to think, because he cannot communicate his thoughts.
1772
Source: On Man
Criticism will point out the author's errors, the public will mock them; that is all the punishment he deserves.
1772
Source: On Man
In any genre whatsoever, one excellent book presupposes an infinity of bad ones.
1772
Source: On Man
It matters little to a nation that an author says foolish things [...] but it matters a great deal that a minister does not do them.
1772
Source: On Man
Freedom of the press [...] is in a people the food of emulation.
1772
Source: On Man
The people are not asked for industry and virtue, but for submission and money.
1772
Source: On Man
[He who refuses the truth] is the ill-bred child; he bites into the poisoned fruit and beats the mother who snatches it from him.
1772
Source: On Man
Of a true and courageous citizen, they make a fool who is punished. Of a base and vile citizen, they make a wise man who is rewarded.
1772
Source: On Man
The lights [of the wise] illuminate no one; they are lamps in tombs.
1772
Source: On Man
When heaven [...] wishes to punish a sovereign, it inspires in him a taste for flattery and a hatred of contradiction.
1772
Source: On Man
The flattered patient is abandoned; his end is near. Without the freedom [to speak the truth], the state and the prince are lost.
1772
Source: On Man
The present interest of pride almost always prevails over any future interest.
1772
Source: On Man
To hinder the press is to insult a nation; to forbid it to read certain books is to declare it enslaved or imbecilic.
1772
Source: On Man
Men are always against reason when reason is against them.
18th century
Source: Thoughts and Reflections
Making one's fortune is not synonymous with making one's happiness.
18th century
Source: Thoughts and Reflections
We often sacrifice the greatest pleasures of life to the pride of sacrificing them.
18th century
Source: Thoughts and Reflections
Stupidity always wants to speak, and has nothing to say.
18th century
Source: Thoughts and Reflections
History is the novel of facts, and the novel is the history of feelings.
18th century
Source: Thoughts and Reflections
Only small minds pay attention to everything: theirs is a small garden that they easily keep tidy.
18th century
Source: Thoughts and Reflections
What makes men happy is to love doing what they have to do.
18th century
Source: Thoughts and Reflections
A wise man enjoys pleasures, and does without them, as one does with fruits in winter.
18th century
Source: Thoughts and Reflections
Truth, for fools, is a torch that shines in the fog without dispelling it.
18th century
Source: Thoughts and Reflections
Humanity is a reflective feeling; education alone develops and strengthens it.
18th century
Source: Thoughts and Reflections
Whoever is perpetually on guard against himself always makes himself unhappy for fear of sometimes being so.
18th century
Source: Thoughts and Reflections
The small faults in a great work are the crumbs thrown to envy.
18th century
Source: Thoughts and Reflections
To reason, for most men, is the sin against nature.
18th century
Source: Thoughts and Reflections
Belief in prejudice passes for common sense in the world.
18th century
Source: Thoughts and Reflections
Virtue has many preachers, and few martyrs.
18th century
Source: Thoughts and Reflections
Merit [...] produces envy, as the body produces a shadow. Envy announces merit as smoke announces fire and flame.
1772
Source: On Man
The day of glory almost never shines except upon the tomb of great men.
1772
Source: On Man
He who deserves esteem rarely enjoys it, and he who sows the laurel rarely rests in its shade.
1772
Source: On Man
Nature has made man envious. To want to change him is to want him to cease loving himself; it is to want the impossible.
1772
Source: On Man
Let the legislator therefore not aim to silence jealousy, but to render its rage powerless.
1772
Source: On Man
Praise is a tribute that youth willingly pays to merit, and which mature age will always refuse it.
1772
Source: On Man
At thirty, the emulation of twenty has already transformed into envy. If one loses hope of equaling those one admires, admiration gives way to hatred.
1772
Source: On Man
The resource of pride is the contempt of talents. The wish of the mediocre man is to have no superior.
1772
Source: On Man
Why do people speak so much ill of witty people? It is because they feel inwardly forced to think well of them.
1772
Source: On Man
If one does not rise above one's fellow citizens, one wants to lower them to one's own level.
1772
Source: On Man
He who can compose good works does not amuse himself by criticizing those of others. The inability to do well produces the critic.
1772
Source: On Man
To blame relentlessly is envy's way of praising. It is the first praise that the author of a good work receives.
1772
Source: On Man
When it comes to envy, there is only one man who can believe himself exempt from it; it is he who has never examined himself.
1772
Source: On Man
We love neither study nor glory for themselves, but for the pleasures, esteem, and power they provide.
1772
Source: On Man
The crown woven by foolishness does not fit on the head of genius.
1772
Source: On Man
To please private circles, it is not necessary for the horizon of our ideas to be very broad. To distinguish oneself [...], one must undertake very different studies.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Having become almost insensitive to the praise and satire of nations, a man can break all the bonds of prejudice and examine with a tranquil eye the contradiction of human opinions.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Public esteem is the only one worthy of envy, the only one desirable, since it is always a gift of public gratitude, and consequently the proof of a real merit.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The noble pleasure of being esteemed consoles illustrious people even for the injustices of fortune.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Contempt for reputation [...] is always inspired by the despair of ever becoming illustrious.
1758
Source: On the Mind
One must praise what one has, and disdain what one does not have: it is a necessary effect of pride.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Any man, when passions do not obscure the light of his reason, will always be the more indulgent the more enlightened he is.
1758
Source: On the Mind
If the great man is the most indulgent, it is because the height of his mind does not allow him to dwell on the vices of an individual, but on those of men in general.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Merit is like gunpowder; its explosion is all the stronger for being more compressed.
1758
Source: On the Mind
If the envious are wicked, it is because they are unhappy; their crimes are but vengeance.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The man of wit knows that men are what they must be; that all hatred against them is unjust; that a fool bears follies as a wild tree bears bitter fruit.
1758
Source: On the Mind
If not every madman is a man of wit, at least every man of wit will always seem mad to the narrow-minded.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The public knows and esteems only merit proven by deeds. It asks [...]: By what work have you enlightened humanity?
1758
Source: On the Mind
Whoever wants to know exactly what he is worth can only learn it from the public, and must therefore expose himself to its judgment.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The degree of wit necessary to please us is a fairly accurate measure of the degree of wit we possess.
1758
Source: On the Mind
To seek truths and to discover them, has it not always been to seek and find enemies?
1758
Source: Letters concerning the Book on the Mind
There are too many honest people with an interest in lies for one to escape them.
1758
Source: Letters concerning the Book on the Mind
False citizens, false friends, false sages, and, worse than all that, the falsely devout, four species of incarnate liars who, as soon as their own interests are at stake, would deny the existence of the four elements.
1758
Source: Letters concerning the Book on the Mind
Can one be better than others with impunity in the career of wit?
1758
Source: Letters concerning the Book on the Mind
The storm has passed, the work remains, and will remain forever, for the glory and justification of its illustrious author.
1758
Source: Letters concerning the Book on the Mind
Epic poems, tragedies, and philosophical books make one too unhappy.
1758
Source: Letters concerning the Book on the Mind
The number [of philosophers] increases through persecution itself. They have only to be wise, and above all to be united, and you can be sure they will triumph.
1758
Source: Letters concerning the Book on the Mind
Fools will dread their contempt, people of wit will be their disciples; the light will spread in France as in England.
1758
Source: Letters concerning the Book on the Mind
We do not care that our laborers and our workers be enlightened; but we want the people of the world to be, and they will be.
1758
Source: Letters concerning the Book on the Mind
It is the greatest good we can do for society; it is the only way to soften morals, which superstition always makes atrocious.
1758
Source: Letters concerning the Book on the Mind
Live, think, write freely, because liberty is a gift from God, and is not licentiousness.
1758
Source: Letters concerning the Book on the Mind
Raise [them] in horror of fanatics, who love neither God, nor the king, nor the philosophers.
1758
Source: Letters concerning the Book on the Mind
He praises wisdom, but only through gritted teeth.
1758
Source: Letters concerning the Book on the Mind
A people without money, if they are enlightened, is commonly a people without tyrants.
1772
Source: On Man
Arbitrary power is established with difficulty in a kingdom without canals, without commerce, and without highways.
1772
Source: On Man
The prince who levies his taxes in kind [...] can rarely bribe and gather the number of men necessary to put a nation in chains.
1772
Source: On Man
If despotism is the cruelest scourge of nations [...], the non-introduction of money [...] can therefore be regarded as a good thing.
1772
Source: On Man
Are you unaware that the countries of luxury are those where the people are the most miserable?
1772
Source: On Man
Would it be [...] the sumptuousness of furnishings and the pursuit of softness that would constitute human happiness? There would be too few happy people.
1772
Source: On Man
Shall we place happiness in the delicacy of the table? [...] the different cuisines of nations prove that good fare is but the accustomed fare.
1772
Source: On Man
All things considered, the temperate person is at the end of the year at least as happy as the glutton.
1772
Source: On Man
Whoever is hungry and can satisfy this need is content.
1772
Source: On Man
Is a man well-fed, well-clothed? The surplus of his happiness depends on the manner [...] in which he fills [...] the interval that separates a satisfied need from a returning one.
1772
Source: On Man
Who will propose to attack a country where one can only gain blows?
1772
Source: On Man
A people [...] is invincible if it is numerous.
1772
Source: On Man
Does the peasant have bacon and cabbage in his pot? He desires neither the hazel grouse of the Alps, nor the carp of the Rhine [...]. None of these dishes are missing for him.
1772
Source: On Man
The strength of passions is always proportional to the strength of the means used to ignite them.
1758
Source: On the Mind
In combat, struck by a mortal blow, they are seen to fall, laugh, and die.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The more intense our passions, the greater the effects they produce.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Success, as all history proves, always accompanies peoples animated by strong passions.
1758
Source: On the Mind
We would submit [...] if we were not [...] protected by two [...] powerful deities [...], Indigence, and Despair which knows no Force.
1758
Source: On the Mind
In morality, as in physics and mechanics, effects are always proportional to their causes.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The intensity of passions depends [...] on the means the legislator employs to ignite them in us, or on the positions in which fortune places us.
1758
Source: On the Mind
It was the combined passions of the love of liberty and the hatred of slavery which, more than the skill of engineers, made for the famous and stubborn defenses.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Small means always produce small passions and small effects: great motives are needed to excite us to bold undertakings.
1758
Source: On the Mind
It is weakness, even more than foolishness, that in most governments perpetuates abuses.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Discipline is, so to speak, only the art of inspiring in soldiers more fear of their officers than of the enemy.
1758
Source: On the Mind
[Fear] often has the effect of courage; but it does not hold up against the fierce and stubborn valor of a people animated by fanaticism or a keen love of their country.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The principles of [the art of inspiring passions], as certain as those of geometry, seem to have been perceived [...] only by great men.
1758
Source: On the Mind
[...] the equal degree of credulity that, among all peoples, produces the equilibrium of their passions and their courage.
1758
Source: On the Mind
One must always remember that in morality, as in physics and mechanics, effects are always proportional to their causes.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The introduction and perfection of arts and sciences in an empire do not cause its decline. But the very same causes that accelerate the progress of sciences sometimes produce the most fatal effects.
1772
Source: On Man
In any country [...], the only moment favorable to letters is unfortunately when [...] expiring liberty succumbs to the efforts of despotism.
1772
Source: On Man
In the first moments of slavery, minds, still enlivened by the memory of their lost liberty, are in a state of agitation much like that of the waters after a storm.
1772
Source: On Man
When despotism is established, what does the monarch desire? To inspire in his subjects a love for the arts and sciences. What does he fear? That they might look upon their own chains.
1772
Source: On Man
[The despot] therefore wants to hide their debasement from them; he wants to occupy their minds; to this end, he presents them with new objects of glory.
1772
Source: On Man
The morals of a nation do not change at the very moment despotism is established. The spirit of the citizens remains free for some time after their hands are tied.
1772
Source: On Man
Every great revolution in an empire impresses the imagination, and implies [...] some great quality, or at least some brilliant vice that astonishment [...] can transform into virtue.
1772
Source: On Man
In states, the reign of arts and sciences hardly extends beyond a century or two.
1772
Source: On Man
It is at the highest peak of its greatness that a nation usually bears the fruits of science and the arts.
1772
Source: On Man
[...] the people [...] have become accustomed to servitude; their soul has lost its energy; no strong passion sets it in motion.
1772
Source: On Man
Nascent despotism lets you say anything, as long as it is allowed to do anything. But entrenched despotism forbids speaking, thinking, and writing.
1772
Source: On Man
Then minds fall into apathy. Chained genius heavily drags its irons; it no longer flies, it crawls.
1772
Source: On Man
In a kingdom of the blind, which citizen would be the most odious? The one who can see. In the empire of ignorance, the same fate awaits the enlightened citizen.
1772
Source: On Man
A great nation where despotic power has established itself is comparable to an oak crowned by centuries. [...] its true state is one of decay.
1772
Source: On Man
Does merit no longer lead to honors? It is despised. [...] when favor alone bestows positions, the nation is then without energy, great men disappear from it.
1772
Source: On Man
In a country where money is current, can one promise to always maintain a fair balance between the fortunes of citizens?
1772
Source: On Man
Can one prevent wealth from being distributed very unequally in the long run [...]? This project is impossible.
1772
Source: On Man
The rich, provided with the necessities, will always put their surplus money into the purchase of superfluities.
1772
Source: On Man
If the rich no longer have free use of their money, money would seem less desirable to them; they would make less effort to acquire it.
1772
Source: On Man
In any country where money is current, [...] the love of money [...] is a principle of life and activity whose destruction would lead to that of the state.
1772
Source: On Man
Nothing is more contradictory than the opinions of moralists.
1772
Source: On Man
[Moralists] want at the same time [...] to introduce an austerity of morals incompatible with the commercial spirit.
1772
Source: On Man
The moralist who in the morning recommends rich manufactures [...] declaims in the evening against luxury, shows, and the morals of the capital.
1772
Source: On Man
What is the government's objective when it perfects its manufactures, when it expands its commerce? It is to attract its neighbors' money.
1772
Source: On Man
Who doubts that the morals and amusements of the capital contribute to this effect [of attracting money]?
1772
Source: On Man
[...] are not the shows, the actresses, the expenses they incur [...] one of the most lucrative parts of commerce [...]?
1772
Source: On Man
What does it matter to booksellers? The public buys; that is enough for them.
1758
Source: On the Mind
[A work] fit to bring general attention back to the true sources of public happiness.
1758
Source: On the Mind
[The philosopher] has revealed to men, for their happiness, most important truths.
1758
Source: On the Mind
I appeal to the unprejudiced youth, who love to learn [...].
1758
Source: On the Mind
[In these editions one finds] the numerous errors added [...] by the ignorance and greed of counterfeiters.
1758
Source: On the Mind
They have disfigured the works he had made; they have attributed to him ones that did not belong to him.
1758
Source: On the Mind
[The work] has always been reprinted with the cancels that the persecutors [...] forced his friends to insert.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Helvétius had corrected and perfected his work; many notes were removed or merged into the text; entire chapters were redone or deleted.
1758
Source: On the Mind
[The good publisher] does as much honor to his art by the beauty of his editions as by the care he takes in researching the best texts.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The first part [...] is but a development of the principles of the book 'De l'Esprit'.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The scholar died before having finished his translation.
1758
Source: On the Mind
It is not known how, from this copy, the first edition of this work was made, which since served for the multiplied editions.
1758
Source: On the Mind
A bad form of government is one where the interests of the citizens are divided and contrary, where the law does not equally compel them to contribute to the general good.
1772
Source: On Man
Man receives two educations: that of childhood, given by masters; that of adolescence, given by the form of government in which one lives and the customs of one's nation.
1772
Source: On Man
If the precepts of childhood education are contradicted by the form of government, they are null.
1772
Source: On Man
Let a young man, upon entering the world, see the maxims of his masters honored by public approval; [...] they will become the rule of his conduct; he will be virtuous.
1772
Source: On Man
Always in fear, always exposed to violence, can a citizen love virtue and the fatherland?
1772
Source: On Man
If one is constantly obliged to repel force with force to ensure one's happiness, it matters little to be just; it is enough to be strong.
1772
Source: On Man
In an arbitrary government, who is the strong one? The one who pleases the despots and sub-despots.
1772
Source: On Man
The desire for happiness [...] must force one to indulge in vice when, by the form of government, wealth, honors, and felicity are its rewards.
1772
Source: On Man
In any country where the powerless law cannot protect the weak from the strong, one seeks wealth and positions [...] as a means of escaping oppression.
1772
Source: On Man
The praise of magnanimous men is on everyone's lips, and in no one's heart; no one in their conduct is the dupe of such praise.
1772
Source: On Man
To what are a father's counsels to his son reduced in a despotic government? To this frightening phrase: "My son, be low, groveling, without virtues [...] without character."
1772
Source: On Man
[In a despotic regime], remember every moment of your life that you are a slave.
1772
Source: On Man
What greater folly is there than to give an honest and magnanimous education to a man destined by the form of government to be nothing but a vile courtier and an obscure scoundrel?
1772
Source: On Man
In any country where virtue is odious to the powerful, it is equally useless and foolish to claim to form honest citizens.
1772
Source: On Man
Wherever the law, without force, cannot protect the weak from the powerful, opulence can be seen as a means of escaping injustice [...].
1772
Source: On Man
We desire [...] a great fortune as a protector and a shield against oppressors.
1772
Source: On Man
[The] needs [of the idle rich] are fantasies, and [...] fantasies have no bounds. To want to satisfy them is to want to fill the barrel of the Danaïdes.
1772
Source: On Man
Wherever citizens have no part in government, [...] whoever is above need has no motive to study and learn; his soul is void of ideas.
1772
Source: On Man
Without resources within himself, it is from the outside that he awaits his happiness.
1772
Source: On Man
Too lazy to go towards pleasure, he would like pleasure to come to him. But pleasure often keeps one waiting [...].
1772
Source: On Man
Does my happiness depend on others? Am I passive in my amusements? Can I not tear myself away from boredom?
1772
Source: On Man
Little fortune is enough for the happiness of the busy man; the greatest is not enough for the happiness of an idle one.
1772
Source: On Man
A hundred villages must be ruined to amuse one idle person.
1772
Source: On Man
It is not the poor, but the idle rich, who most keenly feel the need for immense wealth.
1772
Source: On Man
Has wealth numbed a man's faculty of thought? He gives himself over to laziness; he feels at once the pain of moving and the boredom of not being moved [...].
1772
Source: On Man
Oh, you destitute, you are doubtless not the only miserable ones. To soften your ills, consider this opulent idle man [...].
1772
Source: On Man
The busy man is seldom bored, and desires little.
1772
Source: On Man
He who has no needs is indifferent to wealth.
1772
Source: On Man
Any religion [...] founded on the fear of an invisible power is a tale which, when acknowledged by a nation, is called religion; when disavowed by that same nation, is called superstition.
1772
Source: On Man
The nine incarnations of Vishnu are religion in India, and a fairy tale in Nuremberg.
1772
Source: On Man
If I am to believe my nurse and my tutor, every other religion is false; mine alone is the true one.
1772
Source: On Man
But is [my religion] recognized as such by the universe? No; the earth still groans under a multitude of temples dedicated to error.
1772
Source: On Man
There is no [religion] that is not the religion of some country.
1772
Source: On Man
History [...] teaches us that all religions can be considered as political institutions that have a great influence on the happiness of nations.
1772
Source: On Man
Since the human mind still produces new religions from time to time, it is important, to make them as harmless as possible, to indicate the plan to be followed in their creation.
1772
Source: On Man
All religions are false, with the exception of the Christian religion; but I do not confuse it with Popery.
1772
Source: On Man
It is the greater or lesser attention which engraves objects more or less deeply in the memory [...], it is ultimately to this attention that we owe almost all our ideas.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The inequality of mind caused by the different constitution of men is [...] imperceptible.
1758
Source: On the Mind
We must [...] examine whether the lack of attention in men is the effect of a physical inability to apply oneself, or of a too weak desire to learn.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Physical sensibility and personal interest have been the authors of all justice.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Interest is the measure of men's actions.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Any convention where private interest is in opposition to the general interest would always have been violated, if legislators had not [...] proposed great rewards for virtue.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The laws, made for the happiness of all, would be observed by none, if the magistrates were not armed with the necessary power to ensure their execution.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The discovery of a truth at no moment requires more effort of attention than following a demonstration does.
1758
Source: On the Mind
When we believe attention is difficult to bear, it is because we mistake the fatigue of boredom and impatience for the fatigue of application.
1758
Source: On the Mind
What makes attention tiring is the motive that determines us to it. [...] Is it the hope of pleasure? Attention then becomes a pleasure in itself.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Genius is less the prize of attention than a gift of chance, which presents to all [...] happy ideas from which only he who [...] is attentive to seize them profits.
1758
Source: On the Mind
In works of the mind as in mechanics, what one loses in time, one gains in strength.
1758
Source: On the Mind
All our false judgments are the effect of either our passions or our ignorance: from which it follows that all men are by nature endowed with an equally just mind.
1758
Source: On the Mind
To overcome the distaste for study, one must [...] be animated by a passion.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The strength of our attention is [...] proportional to the strength of our passion.
1758
Source: On the Mind
[Man's] conservation, like that of almost all animal species, is linked to the destruction of others.
1772
Source: On Man
The man of nature is his own butcher, his own cook; his hands are always stained with blood. Accustomed to murder, he must be deaf to the cry of pity.
1772
Source: On Man
The closer one gets to this state [of nature], the more one becomes accustomed to murder, the less it costs.
1772
Source: On Man
He whom a good education does not accustom to see in the misfortunes of others those to which he himself is exposed, will always be harsh, and often bloodthirsty.
1772
Source: On Man
The common people [...] do not have the spirit to be humane.
1772
Source: On Man
It is [...] curiosity that draws him [to an execution]: yes, the first time; if he returns, he is cruel.
1772
Source: On Man
Whoever maintains the original goodness of men wants to deceive them.
1772
Source: On Man
Shall we take for natural goodness in man the consideration that mutual fear inspires in two beings of roughly equal strength?
1772
Source: On Man
Civilized man himself, if he is no longer restrained by this fear, becomes cruel and barbaric.
1772
Source: On Man
It is on the fear he inspires [...] that the despot measures his glory and his greatness.
1772
Source: On Man
Freed from the fear of laws or reprisals, man's injustices have no other measure than that of his power.
1772
Source: On Man
Humanity in them is the effect of education and not of nature.
1772
Source: On Man
Born among the Iroquois, these same [good] men would have adopted their barbaric and cruel customs.
1772
Source: On Man
[Rome] is being pillaged [...] an impatient Arcadius interrupts the account: 'Have they,' he says, 'saved my chicken?'
1772
Source: On Man
'Wretches, [...] finish dying; the subah is resting. What slave would dare interrupt his sleep?' Such is despotism.
1772
Source: On Man
Wherever the people are held in no esteem, what is called the spirit of the age is merely the spirit of the trendsetters [...].
1758
Source: On the Mind
The man of the world [...] is usually more sensitive to what is well-said than to what is well-thought.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Praise is tedious for anyone who is not its object.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The spirit of conversation is reduced [...] to the talent of speaking ill of others agreeably.
1758
Source: On the Mind
One cannot praise a man's superiority without wounding everyone's vanity.
1758
Source: On the Mind
There are two ways to praise oneself: one, by speaking well of oneself; the other, by speaking ill of others.
1758
Source: On the Mind
It is by mocking a fool that one indirectly boasts of one's own wit.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The man of whom no ill is spoken is generally a man of whom no good can be said.
1758
Source: On the Mind
[...] the great man concerns himself only with great things.
1758
Source: On the Mind
One no longer reads to learn, but to criticize.
1758
Source: On the Mind
It takes no less wit to perceive the beauties of a work than its flaws.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The man of wit [...] usually perceives in conversation only what is said well, and the mediocre man only what is said ill or ridiculously.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Time has, in each century, presented some truths to men; but it still has many gifts left to give us.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The axiom that all has been said and thought is [...] a false axiom, first found by ignorance, and since repeated by envy.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Premature distrust is the sure sign of a depraved heart and an unhappy character.
1758
Source: On the Mind
This desire [to be a despot] stems from the love of pleasure, and consequently from human nature itself.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Everyone wants to be as happy as possible; everyone wants to be vested with a power that forces others to contribute with all their might to their happiness.
1758
Source: On the Mind
[...] to govern a people according to its laws, one must know them, meditate on them, and endure arduous studies, which laziness always seeks to avoid.
1758
Source: On the Mind
To satisfy this laziness, everyone therefore aspires to absolute power, which [...] slavishly subjects men to their will.
1758
Source: On the Mind
To be [a despot], one must diminish the power of the great and of the people, and consequently divide the interests of the citizens.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Once division is sown among citizens, to debase and degrade their souls, one must constantly flash the sword of tyranny before the people's eyes.
1758
Source: On the Mind
It is by thus keeping souls in the perpetual anguish of fear that tyranny knows how to debase them.
1758
Source: On the Mind
[Under tyranny], virtues were death sentences. [...] the slave was the spy of his master, the freedman of his patron, the friend of his friend.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The people rarely foresee the evils that an established tyranny prepares for them.
1758
Source: On the Mind
[Princes] do not know that they themselves hang the sword that will strike them over their own heads.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The habitual use of [force] [...] either revolts the citizens and incites them to vengeance, or it insensibly accustoms them to recognize no other justice than force.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Once the soldier has known his strength, it is no longer possible to contain him.
1758
Source: On the Mind
To command slaves, the despot is therefore forced to obey ever-restless and imperious militias.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Whoever, under the pretext of maintaining the prince's authority, wishes to extend it to arbitrary power, is at once a bad father, a bad citizen, and a bad subject.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Receive this sword from me, and use it during my reign, either to defend in me a just prince, or to punish in me a tyrant.
1758
Source: On the Mind
In metaphysics and morality, the abuse of words and the ignorance of their true meaning is [...] a labyrinth where even the greatest geniuses have sometimes gone astray.
1758
Source: On the Mind
[Certain thinkers], entrenched behind the obscurity of words, are much like blind men who, to make the fight equal, would draw a sighted man into a dark cave.
1758
Source: On the Mind
One must walk only with observation, stop the moment it abandons us, and have the courage to be ignorant of what cannot yet be known.
1758
Source: On the Mind
It is from the depths of imagination that [the system] of the universe has been drawn so far; [...] philosophers have only [...] truncated news of the world's system.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Self-love is nothing other than a sentiment engraved in us by nature; this sentiment is transformed [...] into vice or virtue, according to the tastes and passions that animate it.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The clear sight of the indifference of almost all people towards us is a distressing spectacle for our vanity; but in the end, we must take people as they are.
1758
Source: On the Mind
To be irritated by the effects of [men's] self-love is to complain of the spring showers, the summer heat, the autumn rains, and the winter ice.
1758
Source: On the Mind
To love men, one must expect little from them.
1758
Source: On the Mind
To see their faults without bitterness, one must get used to forgiving them, to feel that indulgence is a justice that weak humanity has the right to demand from wisdom.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Have not the most enlightened men almost always been the most indulgent.
1758
Source: On the Mind
All our wills are but the effect of our tendency towards our real or apparent happiness. In this sense, one cannot attach any clear idea to the word freedom [of the will].
1758
Source: On the Mind
If [...] we are disciples of friends, parents, readings, and finally of all the objects that surround us, [...] all our thoughts and wills are necessary consequences of the impressions we have received.
1758
Source: On the Mind
A philosophical treatise on freedom would be but a treatise on effects without a cause.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The Romans, for want of attaching precise ideas to the word 'royalty,' grant [to Caesar], under the name of 'imperator,' the power they refuse him under the name of 'rex'.
1758
Source: On the Mind
All errors of the mind have their source either in the passions or in ignorance [...]. Error is therefore not essentially attached to the nature of the human mind.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Laziness is natural to man; [...] he constantly gravitates towards rest, as bodies do towards a center.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Boredom is a more general and powerful force in the universe than one might imagine.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The desire for happiness will always make us regard the absence of pleasure as an evil.
1758
Source: On the Mind
We would wish, through ever new impressions, to be reminded of our existence at every moment, because each of these reminders is a pleasure for us.
1758
Source: On the Mind
It is this need to be stirred [...] which partly contains the principle of the inconstancy and perfectibility of the human mind.
1758
Source: On the Mind
After having partly exhausted the combinations of the beautiful, [artists] substitute the singular for it, which we prefer to the beautiful, because it makes a newer impression on us.
1758
Source: On the Mind
It is the fear of boredom that makes most men act and think.
1758
Source: On the Mind
In centuries where great passions are chained [...] boredom then becomes the universal driving force.
1758
Source: On the Mind
In general, we wish to be moved without taking the trouble to move ourselves.
1758
Source: On the Mind
We would like to know everything, without taking the trouble to learn.
1758
Source: On the Mind
More docile to opinion than to reason, [...] men indifferently accept [...] all the true or false ideas presented to them.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The slave of opinion is equally senseless in the eyes of the wise, whether he upholds a truth or advances an error.
1758
Source: On the Mind
It is only strong passions that lead to [...] the conception of those great ideas that are the astonishment and admiration of all centuries.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Credulity in men is partly the effect of their laziness. [...] one prefers to believe rather than to examine.
1758
Source: On the Mind
It is not for lack of bored people that we lack great men.
1758
Source: On the Mind
In a government where the rich [...] have no part in the management of public affairs [...] what can the idle rich man do? Love.
1772
Source: On Man
For a mistress to become an occupation, [...] love must be surrounded by perils.
1772
Source: On Man
Love and jealousy are [...] the only remedies for boredom.
1772
Source: On Man
Boredom, without a doubt, formerly played a part in the institution of chivalry.
1772
Source: On Man
[...] a child is soon made. The husband and wife would have been bored for a part of their lives.
1772
Source: On Man
To preserve their desires [...] the knight and his mistress had to [...] commit one to attack, the other to resist.
1772
Source: On Man
Perhaps [...] the valiant knights of yesteryear were [...] bored, boring, talkative, and superstitious.
1772
Source: On Man
To be happy, must our desires be fulfilled as soon as they are conceived? No; pleasure wants to be pursued for some time.
1772
Source: On Man
Can I enjoy a pretty woman upon waking? What is there to do for the rest of the day? Everything will take on the color of boredom.
1772
Source: On Man
Should I see [her] only in the evening? The torch of hope and pleasure will color every moment of my day with a shade of pink.
1772
Source: On Man
If they [the rich and the princes] enjoy everything with indifference, it is because they enjoy without need.
1772
Source: On Man
Need is the principle of both the activity and the happiness of men.
1772
Source: On Man
To be happy, one must have desires, satisfy them with some difficulty, but, the effort made, be sure to enjoy them.
1772
Source: On Man
[Lycurgus] felt that the difficulty of meeting would increase their love, tighten the marital bond, and keep the two spouses in an activity that would pull them from boredom.
1772
Source: On Man
A truth is always the result of just comparisons of the resemblances and differences [...] perceived between various objects.
1772
Source: On Man
In the search for a new truth, who presents the objects of comparison to the inventor? Chance. It is the common master of all inventors.
1772
Source: On Man
The mind necessary to grasp known truths is therefore sufficient to reach unknown ones.
1772
Source: On Man
Few men rise [to unknown truths], but this difference between them is the effect [...] of the different positions in which they find themselves, and of that chain of circumstances to which we give the name of chance.
1772
Source: On Man
This difference between men is the effect [...] of the more or less keen desire they have to distinguish themselves, consequently of the more or less strong passion they have for glory.
1772
Source: On Man
Passions can do everything.
1772
Source: On Man
There is no foolish girl whom love does not make witty.
1772
Source: On Man
The most foolish is often then the most inventive.
1772
Source: On Man
The man without passions is incapable of the degree of application to which superiority of mind is attached.
1772
Source: On Man
Superiority of mind [...] is perhaps less in us the effect of an extraordinary effort of attention than of a habitual one.
1772
Source: On Man
If all men have an equal aptitude for the mind, what then can produce so much difference between them?
1772
Source: On Man
It requires even more attention to follow the demonstration of a known truth than to discover a new one.
1772
Source: On Man
The inventor [...] has the figures [of his science] habitually present in his memory; he recalls them, so to speak, involuntarily.
1772
Source: On Man
As for the student, [...] his attention is therefore necessarily divided between the effort required to recall these figures to his memory, and the observation of their relationships.
1772
Source: On Man
A nation is but the assembly of the citizens who compose it; the interest of each citizen is always, by some tie, attached to the public interest.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Every society is [...] moved by two different kinds of interest. The first, weaker, is common to it and the general society [...] and the second, more powerful, is absolutely particular to it.
1758
Source: On the Mind
[Certain minds are] a charming voice in a room, but too weak for the theater.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The man who occupies himself only with generally interesting ideas [...] is a colossus [...] which, when raised in the public square, becomes the admiration of the citizens.
1758
Source: On the Mind
To please in society, one must not delve deeply into any matter, but flutter incessantly from subject to subject; one must have very varied, and therefore very superficial, knowledge.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The public has no interest in esteeming superficially universal men; [it is] solely interested in esteeming those who make themselves superior in one field.
1758
Source: On the Mind
To obtain general esteem, one must give one's mind more depth than surface, and concentrate [...] in a single point all the heat and rays of one's spirit.
1758
Source: On the Mind
To acquire ideas interesting to the public, one must [...] withdraw into silence and solitude; to please particular societies, on the contrary, one must throw oneself into the whirlwind of the world.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Any man who knows only one way of thinking necessarily regards his own society as the universe par excellence.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Whoever is strongly occupied with the small interests of particular societies must necessarily attach too much esteem and importance to trifles.
1758
Source: On the Mind
What our society is concerned with is what all men should be concerned with; what it thinks, believes, and says, is what the entire universe thinks, believes, and says.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The intrigues and cabals of an ambitious man [...] appear as childish and less sensible than a schoolboy plot to steal a box of sweets.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Ambitious men are but old children who do not believe they are.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Everyone [...] believes they occupy a large space on earth, and imagines that there is only one way of thinking that should be law among men, and that this way of thinking is enclosed within their own society.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Each is everything in the universe; the others are nothing.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The happiness of the future generation is never tied to the misfortune of the present generation.
1772
Source: On Man
In empires, the eternity of abuses is not the effect of our compassion [...], but of the misunderstood interest of the powerful.
1772
Source: On Man
However high a man may be, it is to the nation and not to him that the first respect is due.
1772
Source: On Man
One must not sacrifice the happiness of all to the whims of a single person.
1772
Source: On Man
The sacrifice of all personal interests is owed to the general interest.
1772
Source: On Man
Woe to the harsh and barbarous man who would refuse a citizen even the consolation of complaining! The complaint [...] is always legitimate.
1772
Source: On Man
The discovery of the truth, always useful to the public, was never fatal except to its author.
1772
Source: On Man
The revelation of truth does not alter the peace of states; its very slowness is a guarantee of this.
1772
Source: On Man
There are properly only two kinds of governments, one good, the other bad.
1772
Source: On Man
In no government is the happiness of the ruler linked to the misfortune of the subjects.
1772
Source: On Man
The surest of all means of discovering the truth is the freedom of the press.
1772
Source: On Man
Indifference to truth is a source of errors, and error a source of public calamities.
1772
Source: On Man
It is not under the blows of truth, but under the blows of the powerful that error will succumb.
1772
Source: On Man
A wise government always prepares for the happiness of the future generation in the happiness of the present one.
1772
Source: On Man
Today is the mistress of the young man, and tomorrow that of the old man.
1772
Source: On Man
The word virtue [...] has only an uncertain and vague meaning.
1772
Source: On Man
Everyone claims to love virtue for its own sake. This phrase is on everyone's lips, and in no one's heart.
1772
Source: On Man
Pleasure and pain [...] are also the principles of patriotic virtues.
1772
Source: On Man
Without an interest in loving virtue, there is no virtue.
1772
Source: On Man
To know man [...], one must study him not in his words but in his actions.
1772
Source: On Man
When I speak, I wear a mask; when I act, I am forced to take it off.
1772
Source: On Man
One hates the powerful, one does not despise them. It is not the anger of the giant that is disdained, but that of the pygmy.
1772
Source: On Man
One does not truly despise what one dares not despise to their face. Secret contempt is a proof of weakness [...].
1772
Source: On Man
The homage paid to virtue is fleeting; the homage paid to strength is eternal.
1772
Source: On Man
Strength is everything on earth. Virtue without credit perishes there.
1772
Source: On Man
Has the tyrant, by means of luxury and softness, secured himself on the throne? [...] The seed of heroism is stifled.
1772
Source: On Man
Seditious and rebel are the injurious names that the powerful oppressor gives to the weak oppressed.
1772
Source: On Man
In any empire where the momentary whims of the prince are law, all laws are contradictory; and one perceives no moral principles either in those who govern or in those who are governed.
1772
Source: On Man
To form clear ideas [of virtue], one must live in a country where public utility is the sole measure of the merit of human actions.
1772
Source: On Man
For every nation, there is a time of stupidity and degradation [...]. These centuries of degradation are usually those of despotism.
1758
Source: On the Mind
[Under despotism], it is said that God deprives nations of half their intelligence, to harden them against the miseries and torment of servitude.
1758
Source: On the Mind
All that is great has the right to please the eyes and the imagination of men.
1758
Source: On the Mind
We experience that sight hates all that confines it; [...] it loves, on the contrary, to roam over a vast plain, to stretch out over the surface of the seas, to lose itself in a distant horizon.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The pleasure produced by that rough magnificence [...] which nature puts into all her works is infinitely superior to the pleasure that results from the justness of proportions.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Art is so inferior to nature; which [...] means nothing other than that we prefer large paintings to small ones.
1758
Source: On the Mind
It is with imagination as with the mind: it is by contemplation and combination [...] that poets and philosophers alike manage to excel.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The progress of the human mind must be uniform, to whatever science or art it is applied.
1758
Source: On the Mind
To please the mind, one must occupy it without tiring it.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The art of the poet [...] is to offer to the sight only objects in motion, and even, if he can, to strike several senses at once in his descriptions.
1758
Source: On the Mind
All the senses are doors through which agreeable impressions can enter our souls: the more of them one opens at once, the more pleasure enters.
1758
Source: On the Mind
In matters of the mind as in matters of morality, it is always [...] love or gratitude that praises, hatred or vengeance that despises.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Interest is [...] the sole dispenser of men's esteem.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Simplicity in a subject and in an image is a perfection relative to the weakness of our mind.
1758
Source: On the Mind
All objects partake in the ugliness as well as the beauty of the objects to which they are [...] united. To this cause must be attributed most of our unjust disgusts and enthusiasms.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The words weakness, strength, smallness, greatness, crime, etc., are not representative of any substance, that is to say, of any body.
1772
Source: On Man
[Abstract words] presenting us with no idea, it is impossible, as long as they are not applied to some sensible and particular object, to make any judgment upon them.
1772
Source: On Man
The word 'greatness' expresses a relationship, that is, a certain difference or resemblance observed between objects present to our eyes or our memory.
1772
Source: On Man
What is expressed in algebraic language by A and B is expressed in common language by the words weakness, strength, smallness, greatness, etc.
1772
Source: On Man
[Abstract words] only designate a vague relationship between things, and only present us with clear and real ideas the moment they are applied to a specific object.
1772
Source: On Man
What does the word 'to think' actually mean? Either this word is void of meaning, or [...] it simply expresses a human's way of being.
1772
Source: On Man
To make of this mode [thought] a being, and even a spiritual being, is, in my opinion, the most absurd thing.
1772
Source: On Man
What is more vague than the word 'crime'? For this collective term to evoke a clear idea [...], one must apply it to a theft, a murder, or some similar action.
1772
Source: On Man
Men have only invented these kinds of [abstract] words to communicate their ideas more easily, or at least more promptly.
1772
Source: On Man
Any idea whatsoever can, in the final analysis, always be reduced to physical facts or sensations.
1772
Source: On Man
What throws some obscurity on discussions [...] is the uncertain and vague meaning of a certain number of words.
1772
Source: On Man
Every idea and every judgment can be traced back to a sensation.
1772
Source: On Man
It would therefore be useless to admit in us a faculty of judging and comparing distinct from the faculty of feeling.
1772
Source: On Man
What is the principle that makes us compare objects to each other [...]? Interest, which is [...] an effect of physical sensibility.
1772
Source: On Man
Of all the gifts that heaven can bestow upon a nation, the most fatal would undoubtedly be prudence, if heaven made it common to all citizens.
1758
Source: On the Mind
It is therefore to inconsistency that posterity will owe its existence.
1758
Source: On the Mind
It is [...] to imprudence and folly that heaven attaches the preservation of empires and the duration of the world.
1758
Source: On the Mind
To please mediocre people, one must generally lend oneself to common errors, conform to customs, and resemble everyone else.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Whoever is without honor and without temper [...] is a perfect courtier.
1758
Source: On the Mind
How many witty people [...] have played the fool, made themselves ridiculous, affected the greatest mediocrity before superiors, alas! who are all too easy to deceive.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The mediocre man is the beloved man.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Between the man of intrigue and the philosopher one finds [...] the same difference as between the courier and the geographer. The former knows [...] the shortest path [...], but he does not know [...] the surface of the globe.
1758
Source: On the Mind
One must be a small man to desire small things.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Happiness is not the prerogative of high positions; it depends solely on the happy accord of our character with the state and the circumstances in which fortune places us.
1758
Source: On the Mind
History is but a fable agreed upon.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Great passions are the seed of a thousand deviations; and [...] what is called good conduct is almost always the effect of the absence of passions, and consequently the prerogative of mediocrity.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Nothing is mediocre in the passionate man; and it is chance that almost always determines his first steps.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The man who refuses to doubt is subject to a thousand errors: he himself has set the limit of his own mind.
1758
Source: On the Mind
He who would consult reason on everything would be ceaselessly occupied with calculating what he should do, and would never do anything.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Instead of compliments, which usually hide feelings that are not there, my feelings will always hide my compliments.
1737-1771
Source: Helvétius's Letters
If you others chase me away, I will come back [...].
1737-1771
Source: Helvétius's Letters
Regarding what one can be reproached for, [...] all of that was done fifteen or twenty years before.
1737-1771
Source: Helvétius's Letters
I am a sincere admirer [...], and I do not know how this play inspires respect in me.
1737-1771
Source: Helvétius's Letters
The reading so delighted me that I went on [...] without finding a single flaw, or at least without sensing one.
1737-1771
Source: Helvétius's Letters
I do believe there are many [flaws], since the public finds many in it.
1737-1771
Source: Helvétius's Letters
There are hearts that are made for certain genres [...].
1737-1771
Source: Helvétius's Letters
In a word, I do not claim to give my opinion for others.
1737-1771
Source: Helvétius's Letters
When a sultan is in his seraglio, does he choose the most beautiful one? No: he says 'I love her,' he takes her [...].
1737-1771
Source: Helvétius's Letters
I do not know if [someone] is as much above others as I feel it; but I feel that [he] is above others.
1737-1771
Source: Helvétius's Letters
And I am above you through friendship.
1737-1771
Source: Helvétius's Letters
Little account is now made of platonic love: physical love is preferred to it; and the latter is not really the less lively.
1772
Source: On Man
Is the stag inflamed by [physical love]? From timid he becomes brave.
1772
Source: On Man
A coquette is a delightful mistress for the idle.
1772
Source: On Man
[The coquette enters] dressed in that gallant manner which allows all to hope for what she will grant to very few.
1772
Source: On Man
The idle man awakens, his jealousy is aroused, he is torn from boredom.
1772
Source: On Man
Coquettes are needed for the idle, and pretty girls for the busy.
1772
Source: On Man
The hunt for women, like that for game, must be different, according to the time one wants to put into it.
1772
Source: On Man
The clever woman makes the idle man chase her for a long time.
1772
Source: On Man
If one were to depict the love affairs of [the busy man] [...] the romance [...] would be very short.
1772
Source: On Man
If one were to describe [...] the love affairs of idle [men], one would have to give them delicate, cruel, and above all, very prudish mistresses.
1772
Source: On Man
Without such mistresses, [the idle man] would perish from boredom.
1772
Source: On Man
The coquette's strongest passion is to be adored.
1772
Source: On Man
Always arouse men's desires, and almost never satisfy them.
1772
Source: On Man
A woman, the proverb says, is a well-laid table, which one looks at with different eyes before or after the meal.
1772
Source: On Man
Money and its representative papers facilitate borrowing. All governments abuse this facility.
1772
Source: On Man
Everywhere, loans have multiplied, interest has grown; to pay them, tax upon tax had to be accumulated.
1772
Source: On Man
The love of wealth does not spread to all classes of citizens without inspiring in the governing part the desire for theft and vexations.
1772
Source: On Man
[...] the construction of a port, [...] a war undertaken, they say, for the honor of the nation, in short, any pretext to plunder it is eagerly seized.
1772
Source: On Man
All the vices, children of greed, introducing themselves at once into an empire, successively infect all its members, and finally plunge it into ruin.
1772
Source: On Man
Blood, which carries nutrition [...], is a principle of destruction. The circulation of blood [...] becomes a seed of death.
1772
Source: On Man
It is the same with money. Is it strongly desired? This desire vivifies a nation, awakens its industry, animates its commerce, increases its wealth and its power.
1772
Source: On Man
[...] the stagnation [...] of the desire [for money] would be fatal to certain states.
1772
Source: On Man
[Wealth], sooner or later gathered into a few hands, [...] detaches private interest from the public interest.
1772
Source: On Man
[...] an empire, weakening day by day, falls into a collapse that precedes its entire destruction.
1772
Source: On Man
[...] perhaps this is how the moral plant called empire must sprout, grow, rise, and die.
1772
Source: On Man
In any country where money is current, [...] the unequal way in which money is distributed eventually breeds general poverty.
1772
Source: On Man
This kind of poverty is the mother of depopulation.
1772
Source: On Man
The destitute take little care of their children, feed them poorly, and raise few.
1772
Source: On Man
If the power of instruction can substitute small qualities for great ones [...] and thus change our characters for the worse; why couldn't this same instruction change our characters for the better?
1772
Source: On Man
If in education one can make use of necessity, and if its power is irresistible, then one can correct children's faults, change their characters, and change them for the better.
1772
Source: On Man
Virtue consists in the sacrifice of what one calls one's own interest to the public interest.
1772
Source: On Man
Such sacrifices presuppose that men are already gathered in societies, and the laws of these societies perfected to a certain point.
1772
Source: On Man
Where do we find heroes? Among more or less civilized peoples.
1772
Source: On Man
Who would be the most detestable man in any society? The man of nature, who, having made no convention with his fellows, would obey only his own whim.
1772
Source: On Man
It is better to refuse children any education than to give them a bad one.
1772
Source: On Man
The same cause that makes a child a screamer at three makes him rebellious at twelve, quarrelsome at twenty, imperious at thirty, and unbearable his whole life.
1772
Source: On Man
Why would we not hasten to stifle in its still weak passions the germ of the greatest vices?
1772
Source: On Man
A somewhat vigilant mother holds her children's passions in her hands.
1772
Source: On Man
What, indeed, is a character? The product of a lively and constant will, consequently of a strong passion.
1772
Source: On Man
He who can dispose of the cause is the master of the effect.
1772
Source: On Man
All men [...] are apes and imitators: vice is caught by contagion.
1772
Source: On Man
A single brutal or flattering servant is enough to spoil an entire education.
1772
Source: On Man
An indiscreet burst of laughter can set an education back by six months.
1772
Source: On Man
Men [...] are all susceptible to the same degree of passion; their unequal strength is always [...] the effect of the different situations in which chance places them.
1772
Source: On Man
The original character of each man [...] is but the product of his first habits.
1772
Source: On Man
The moment a child [...] opens the gates of life, they enter it without ideas, without passions.
1772
Source: On Man
[Artificial] passions [...] presuppose conventions and laws established among men, and consequently their union in society.
1772
Source: On Man
If one is born without passions, one is also born without character.
1772
Source: On Man
The [character] produced in us by the love of glory is an acquisition, consequently an effect of instruction.
1772
Source: On Man
On the assumption that character were the effect of organization, what could education do?
1772
Source: On Man
Does the moral change the physical?
1772
Source: On Man
What nature does, only nature can undo.
1772
Source: On Man
The only feeling that [nature] has engraved in our hearts from childhood is self-love.
1772
Source: On Man
This [self-]love, founded on physical sensibility, is common to all men.
1772
Source: On Man
In all times and countries, people have loved, do love, and will always love themselves in preference to others.
1772
Source: On Man
If man varies in all his other feelings, it is because every other one is in him the effect of moral causes.
1772
Source: On Man
In Europe, one can count jealousy among the artificial passions. One is jealous there because one is vain.
1772
Source: On Man
Vanity is a component of almost all great European loves.
1772
Source: On Man
It is the fear of boredom that makes most of them act and think.
1758
Source: On the Mind
In general we wish to be moved without taking the trouble to move ourselves; it is for this reason that we would like to know everything, without taking the trouble to learn.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Carried by the ebb and flow of prejudices [...], reasonable or mad by chance, the slave of opinion is equally senseless in the eyes of the wise.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Passions are to the moral world what motion is to the physical: it creates, annihilates, preserves, animates everything; and without it, all is dead.
1758
Source: On the Mind
It is to strong passions that we owe the invention and wonders of the arts; they must [...] be regarded as the productive seed of the mind.
1758
Source: On the Mind
A strong passion is a passion whose object is so necessary to our happiness that life is unbearable to us without the possession of that object.
1758
Source: On the Mind
One is always ignorant of the language of passions one does not feel.
1758
Source: On the Mind
It is [...] the strong passions that, more enlightened than common sense, can alone teach us to distinguish the extraordinary from the impossible, which sensible people almost always confuse.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Before success, great geniuses [...] are almost always treated as madmen by sensible people [...].
1758
Source: On the Mind
The man of common sense is a man in whose character laziness dominates.
1758
Source: On the Mind
It is the eagle eye of the passions that pierces the dark abyss of the future: indifference is born blind and stupid.
1758
Source: On the Mind
One becomes stupid as soon as one ceases to be passionate.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Destroy in a man the passion that animates him, and you deprive him at the same instant of all his enlightenment.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Pride [...] can never be anything but a secret and disguised desire for public esteem.
1758
Source: On the Mind
No friendship without need: it would be an effect without a cause.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Each individual gives the name of 'mind' only to the set of ideas that are useful to them, either as instructive or as pleasant.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Personal interest is [...] the sole judge of men's merit.
1758
Source: On the Mind
To value the ideas of others, one must have an interest in valuing them.
1758
Source: On the Mind
There are men [...] who, friends of truth, [...] keep their minds in that state of suspension which leaves a free entry to new truths.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Hence that sure and prompt instinct that almost all mediocre people have for recognizing and fleeing people of merit.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Tell me who you associate with, and I will tell you who you are.
1758
Source: On the Mind
In matters of morals, opinions, and ideas, [...] it is always oneself that one esteems in others.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Under a stupid monarch, [...] his entire court either is stupid, or becomes so.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Vengeance inspires in them the praise they give to such features, and vengeance is an interest.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The divining rod for discovering a nascent merit [...] turns only in the hands of people of wit, because only a mind can sense a mind.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Any idea too foreign to our way of seeing and feeling always seems ridiculous to us.
1758
Source: On the Mind
It is only to powerlessness that one is, in general, indebted for one's moderation. The humane and moderate man is a very rare man.
1758
Source: On the Mind
It is [...] because the man of wit knows the price of riches, and the rich man is ignorant of the price of enlightenment.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The learned man can appreciate the ignorant one, because he has been one in his childhood; but the ignorant man cannot appreciate the learned one, because he has never been one.
1758
Source: On the Mind
If anyone excels among us, let him go and excel elsewhere.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The mind is nothing other than an assemblage of new ideas and combinations.
1758
Source: On the Mind
If there were no more discoveries to be made in any field, then everything would be science, and wit would be impossible.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Thanks to human ignorance, we will long be permitted to have wit.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The mind, therefore, always presupposes invention.
1758
Source: On the Mind
[The public] likes to see from the height of a principle all the consequences that can be drawn from it; it must therefore reward with a superior title, such as that of genius, whoever provides it with this advantage.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Whoever models himself on the great men who have already preceded him [...], or does not surpass them, [...] has not given enough proof of invention to deserve the title of genius.
1758
Source: On the Mind
Sometimes the author is refused the title that is granted to the work.
1758
Source: On the Mind
To obtain [the title of genius] one must [...] have composed a certain number of excellent tragedies.
1758
Source: On the Mind
The custom that gives the epithet 'good' to the judge, the financier [...] allows us to apply the epithet 'sublime' to the poet, the legislator, the geometer, the orator.
1758
Source: On the Mind
[Invention] supposes [...] more of that obstinacy which triumphs over all difficulties, and more of that boldness of character which forges new paths.
1758
Source: On the Mind
We are forced by the poverty of language to take this expression [the mind/wit] in a thousand different senses, which are distinguished from each other only by the epithets attached to it.
1758
Source: On the Mind
It is not in their capacity as judges or financiers that they have [wit], unless one confuses the quality of a judge with that of a legislator.
1758
Source: On the Mind