There are some men who are counted great because they represent the actuality of their own age, and mirror it as it is. Such an one was Voltaire, of whom it was epigrammatically said: ‘he...

Perhaps there is nothing greater on earth than the sacrifice of youth and beauty, often of high birth, made by the gentle sex in order to work in hospitals for the relief of human misery,...

Do you believe,” said Candide, “that men have always slaughtered each other as they do today, that they’ve always been liars, cheats, traitors, ingrates and thieves, weak, fickle, cowardly, envious, greedy, drunken, miserly, ambitious, bloodthirsty,...

Whatever you do, crush the infamy

The public is a ferocious beast — one must either chain it up or flee from it.

The ancients recommended us to sacrifice to the Graces, but Milton sacrificed to the Devil.

The multitude of books is making us ignorant.

In my life, I have prayed but one prayer: oh Lord, make my enemies ridiculous. And God granted it.

In this country it is considered wise to kill an admiral from time to time in order to encourage the others

A long dispute means both parties are wrong

It is dangerous to be right in matters on which the established authorities are wrong

The punishment of criminals should serve a purpose. When a man is hanged he is useless.

It is the flash which appears, the thunderbolt will follow.

There are truths that are not for all men, nor for all occasions

So it is the human condition that to wish for the greatness of one’s fatherland is to wish evil to one’s neighbors. The citizen of the universe would be the man who wishes his country...

Quand celui à qui l’on parle ne comprend pas et celui qui parle ne se comprend pas, c’est de la métaphysiqueWhen he to whom a person speaks does not understand, and he who speaks does...

Un bon mot ne prouve rien.

May God defend me from my friends; I can defend myself from my enemies.

How I like the boldness of the English, how I like the people who say what they think!

There are some that only employ words for the purpose of disguising their thoughts

It is forbidden to kill; therefore all murderers are punished unless they kill in large numbers and to the sound of trumpets

Men use thought only as authority for their injustice, and employ speech only to conceal their thoughts

Chance is a word void of sense; nothing can exist without a cause.

Every one goes astray, but the least imprudent are they who repent the soonest.

The superfluous is very necessary

Friendship is the marriage of the soul, and this marriage is liable to divorce.

There are truths which are not for all men, nor for all times.

To believe in God is impossible not to believe in Him is absurd.

Tears are the silent language of grief.

The discovery of what is true and the practice of that which is good are the two most important aims of philosophy.

Love truth, and pardon error.

Faith consists in believing what reason cannot.

And ask each passenger to tell his story, and if there is one of them all who has not cursed his existence many times, and said to himself over and over again that he was...

Opinion has caused more trouble on this little earth than plagues or earthquakes

He was a great patriot, a humanitarian, a loyal friend – provided, of course, that he really is dead.

Doubt is uncomfortable, certainty is ridiculous.

All men are born with a nose and ten fingers, but no one was born with a knowledge of God

I believe that there never was a creator of a philosophical system who did not confess at the end of his life that he had wasted his time. It must be admitted that the inventors...

What is madness? To have erroneous perceptions and to reason correctly from them

If we do not find anything pleasant, at least we shall find something new

The superfluous, a very necessary thing

Nature has always had more force than education.

Everything is for the best in this best of possible worlds.

The superfluous, a very necessary thing.

Morality is everywhere the same for all men, therefore it comes from God; sects differ, therefore they are the work of men.

Our labour preserves us from three great evils — weariness, vice, and want.

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

Quizás sea esta absurda debilidad una de nuestras peores inclinaciones: porque ,hay algo más estúpido que soportar un peso que en todo momento se quiere dejar en el suelo?, ,odiar la existencia y al mismo...

It is better to risk saving a guilty man than to condemn an innocent one.

God gave us the gift of life; it is up to us to give ourselves the gift of living well.