I am very fond of truth, but not at all of martyrdom.
Anyone who has the power to make you believe absurdities has the power to make you commit injustices.
The safest course is to do nothing against one's conscience. With this secret, we can enjoy life and have no fear from death.
Society therefore is an ancient as the world.
One great use of words is to hide our thoughts.
Very learned women are to be found, in the same manner as female warriors but they are seldom or ever inventors.
To believe in God is impossible not to believe in Him is absurd.
Nothing would be more tiresome than eating and drinking if God had not made them a pleasure as well as a necessity.
The superfluous, a very necessary thing.
Time, which alone makes the reputation of men, ends by making their defects respectable.
being alone, men & time
It is not sufficient to see and to know the beauty of a work. We must feel and be affected by it.
The ideal form of government is democracy tempered with assassination.
Indeed, history is nothing more than a tableau of crimes and misfortunes.
If God did not exist, it would be necessary to invent Him.
There are truths which are not for all men, nor for all times.
To hold a pen is to be at war.
In this country it is a good thing to kill an admiral from time to time to encourage the others.
Nothing can be more contrary to religion and the clergy than reason and common sense.
He who has not the spirit of this age, has all the misery of it.
If God created us in his own image, we have more than reciprocated.
The art of government is to make two-thirds of a nation pay all it possibly can pay for the benefit of the other third.
He was a great patriot, a humanitarian, a loyal friend provided, of course, he really is dead.
Men use thought only as authority for their injustice, and employ speech only to conceal their thoughts.
What most persons consider as virtue, after the age of 40 is simply a loss of energy.
The opportunity for doing mischief is found a hundred times a day, and of doing good once in a year.
Men hate the individual whom they call avaricious only because nothing can be gained from him.
All styles are good except the tiresome kind.
It is vain for the coward to flee death follows close behind it is only by defying it that the brave escape.
Let us work without theorizing, tis the only way to make life endurable.
History should be written as philosophy.
He is a hard man who is only just, and a sad one who is only wise.
If there were no God, it would be necessary to invent him.
Every man is guilty of all the good he did not do.
Is there anyone so wise as to learn by the experience of others?
He who is not just is severe, he who is not wise is sad.
Friendship is the marriage of the soul, and this marriage is liable to divorce.
I do not agree with what you have to say, but I'll defend to the death your right to say it.
The ancient Romans built their greatest masterpieces of architecture, their amphitheaters, for wild beasts to fight in.
Business is the salt of life.
All men are born with a nose and ten fingers, but no one was born with a knowledge of God.
Stand upright, speak thy thoughts, declare The truth thou hast, that all may share Be bold, proclaim it everywhere: They only live who dare.
It is said that the present is pregnant with the future.
The infinitely little have a pride infinitely great.
It is lamentable, that to be a good patriot one must become the enemy of the rest of mankind.
The best government is a benevolent tyranny tempered by an occasional assassination.
Common sense is not so common.
Better is the enemy of good.
Fear follows crime and is its punishment.
In general, the art of government consists of taking as much money as possible from one class of citizens to give to another.
art, government & money
The very impossibility in which I find myself to prove that God is not, discovers to me his existence.
What a heavy burden is a name that has become too famous.
I have never made but one prayer to God, a very short one: 'O Lord make my enemies ridiculous.' And God granted it.
Never argue at the dinner table, for the one who is not hungry always gets the best of the argument.
One merit of poetry few persons will deny: it says more and in fewer words than prose.
The best is the enemy of the good.
History is only the register of crimes and misfortunes.
It is not love that should be depicted as blind, but self-love.
It is forbidden to kill therefore all murderers are punished unless they kill in large numbers and to the sound of trumpets.
Perfection is attained by slow degrees it requires the hand of time.
An ideal form of government is democracy tempered with assassination.
We are all full of weakness and errors let us mutually pardon each other our follies - it is the first law of nature.
The truths of religion are never so well understood as by those who have lost the power of reason.
We are rarely proud when we are alone.
Tears are the silent language of grief.
I hate women because they always know where things are.
Satire lies about literary men while they live and eulogy lies about them when they die.
God gave us the gift of life it is up to us to give ourselves the gift of living well.
The best way to be boring is to leave nothing out.
Divorce is probably of nearly the same date as marriage. I believe, however, that marriage is some weeks the more ancient.
Love is a canvas furnished by nature and embroidered by imagination.
God is a comedian, playing to an audience too afraid to laugh.