Quotes from Denis Diderot

Men will never be free until the last king is strangled with the entrails of the last priest.

From fanaticism to barbarism is only one step.

All things must be examined, debated, investigated without exception and without regard for anyone's feelings.

L]e philosophe n'a jamais tué de prêtres et le prêtre a tué beaucoup de philosophes... (The philosopher has never killed any priests, whereas the priest has killed a great many philosophers.)

We swallow greedily any lie that flatters us, but we sip only little by little at a truth we find bitter.

Scepticism is the first step towards truth.

Happiest are the people who give most happiness to others

A nation which thinks that it is belief in God and not good law which makes people honest does not seem to me very advanced.

Life is but a series of misunderstandings.

For me, my thoughts are my prostitutes.

Every man has his dignity. I'm willing to forget mine, but at my own discretion and not when someone else tells me to.

Poetry must have something in it that is barbaric, vast and wild.

I am wholly yours - you are everything to me; we will sustain each other in all the ills of life it may please fate to inflict upon us; you will soothe my troubles; I will comfort you in yours.

Whether God exists or does not exist, He has come to rank among the most sublime and useless truths.

Oh! how near are genius and madness! Men imprison them and chain them, or raise statues to them.

As long as the centuries continue to unfold, the number of books will grow continually, and one can predict that a time will come when it will be almost as difficult to learn anything from books as from the direct study of the whole universe. It will be almost as convenient to search for some bit of truth concealed in nature as it will be to find it hidden away in an immense multitude of bound volumes.

There is no moral precept that does not have something inconvenient about it.

The fact is that she was terribly undressed and I was extremely undressed too. The fact is that I still had my hand where she didn't have anything and she had hers where the same wasn't quite true of me. The fact is that I found myself underneath her and consequently she found herself on top of me.

What is a monster? A being whose survival is incompatible with the existing order.

People stop thinking when they cease to read.

Only passions, great passions, can elevate the soul to great things.

If you want me to believe in God, you must make me touch him.

The best order of things, as I see it, is the one that includes me; to hell with the most perfect of worlds, if I'm not part of it.

One swallows the lie that flatters, but sips the bitter truth drop by drop.