The superfluous is very necessary.

I have only ever made one prayer to God, a very short one: O Lord, make my enemies ridiculous. And God granted it.

When he to whom one speaks does not understand, and he who speaks himself does not understand, that is metaphysics.

Vous craignez les livres comme certaines bourgades ont craint les violons. Laissez lire, et laissez danser; ces deux amusements ne feront jamais de mal au monde.

Toleration is the prerogative of humanity; we are all full of weaknesses and mistakes; let us reciprocally forgive ourselves. It is the first law of nature.La tolérance, c’est l’apanage de l’humanité; nous sommes tous pétris...

The pursuit of what is true and the practice of what is good are the two most important objects of philosophy.

We must distinguish between speaking to deceive and being silent to be reserved.

Everything’s fine today, that is our illusion.

Animals have these advantages over man: they never hear the clock strike, they die without any idea of death, they have no theologians to instruct them, their last moments are not disturbed by unwelcome and...

The best way to be boring is to leave nothing out

The great consolation in life is to say what one thinks.

As long as people believe in absurdities they will continue to commit atrocities

You must have the devil in you to succeed in any of the arts

Every man is the creature of the age in which he lives; very few are able to raise themselves above the ideas of the time.

It is not sufficient to see and to know the beauty of a work. We must feel and be affected by it.

One great use of words is to hide our thoughts.

‎Life is a shipwreck, but we must not forget to sing in the lifeboats.

We all look for happiness, but without knowing where to find it: like drunkards who look for their house, knowing dimly that they have one

I do not know by what power I think; but well I know that I should never have thought without the assistance of my senses. That there are immaterial and intelligent substances I do not...

Martin in particular concluded that man was born to live either in the convulsions of misery, or in the lethargy of boredom.

In the beginning God created man in His own image, and man has been trying to repay the favor ever since.

God is a comedian, playing to an audience too afraid to laugh.

It is not more surprising to be born twice than once; everything in nature is resurrection

Life is thickly sown with thorns, and I know no other remedy than to pass quickly through them. The longer we dwell on our misfortunes, the greater is their power to harm us.

It is not love that should be depicted as blind, but self-love.

I advise you to go on living solely to enrage those who are paying your annuities. It is the only pleasure I have left.

All styles are good except the tiresome kind.

You can never correct your work well until you have forgotten it

But nothing is more estimable than a physician who, having studied nature from his youth, knows the properties of the human body, the diseases which assail it, the remedies which will benefit it, exercises his...

God is a circle whose center is everywhere and circumference nowhere.

The infinitely little have a pride infinitely great.