Quotes About Voltaire

O Voltaire! O humanity! O idiocy! There is something ticklish in the truth, and in the SEARCH for the truth; and if man goes about it too humanely—il ne cherche le vrai que pour faire le bien—I wager he finds nothing!

Now, now my good man, this is no time to be making enemies." (Voltaire on his deathbed in response to a priest asking him that he renounce Satan.)

Isaac Newton had demonstrated to Voltaire's satisfaction that human reason alone can discover the true inner workings of nature and the universe. Indeed, the human mind could achieve almost any goal it set for itself, as long as it remained grounded in experience and truth.

I know many books which have bored their readers, but I know of none which has done real evil.

As to his religious notions—why, as Voltaire said, incantations will destroy a flock of sheep if administered with a certain quantity of arsenic. I look for the man who will bring the arsenic, and don't mind about his incantations. Very

As to his religious notions—why, as Voltaire said, incantations will destroy a flock of sheep if administered with a certain quantity of arsenic.

as Voltaire said, incantations will destroy a flock of sheep if administered with a certain quantity of arsenic.

Religion was instituted to make us happy in this life and in the other. What must we do to be happy in the life to come? Be just.

Voltaire was the first literary man to erect his incompetence into a procedure, a method.

Voltaire says, we shall leave this world as foolish and as wicked as we found it on our arrival.

The Franklin known to the French, the Franklin who had briefly visited Paris in 1767 and 1769 was—in Voltaire's description—the discoverer of electricity, a man of genius, a first name in science, a successor to Newton and Galileo.

Voltaire, Kant, Bentham—all assumed that reason could construct morality from scratch. But their moralities did not coincide. Practically speaking, their morality lifted elements, even if unconsciously, from the Judeo-Christian tradition and Greek telos they suggested they had exploded.

Voltaire lighted a torch and gave to others the sacred flame. The light still shines and will as long as man loves liberty and seeks for truth.

Voltaire's Candide who asserts that "all is for the best in the best of all possible worlds.

Voltaire once described optimism as "a cruel philosophy with a consoling name," which immediately suggests what pessimism might be: a consoling philosophy with a cruel name.

Ah ! ce qui manque à la société moderne, ce n'est pas un Christ, ni un Washington, ni un Socrate, ni un Voltaire même ; c'est un Aristophane, mais il serait lapidé par le public

And involuntarily I compared the childish sarcasm, the religious sarcasm of Voltaire with the irresistible irony of the German philosopher whose influence is henceforth ineffaceable.

used to quote Voltaire to me: "Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good.

This self-love is the instrument of our preservation; it resembles the provision for the perpetuity of mankind: it is necessary, it is dear to us, it gives us pleasure, and we must conceal it.

Well, there's just some universal truths in a way that I've just observed to be true. You read Voltaire. You read modern literature. Anywhere you go, there's these observations about romantic love and what it does people, and these rotten feelings that rarely are people meaning to do that to each other.

Originality is nothing but judicious imitation. So said Voltaire, the realist." "You agree with that?" "Everything has boundaries. The same holds true with thought. You shouldn't fear boundaries, but you also should not be afraid of destroying them. That's what is most important if you want to be free: respect for and exasperation with boundaries.

Originality is nothing but judicious imitation. So said Voltaire, the realist.

Once home [in 1838], Albert prepared a small album of scenes he had drawn on the journey, a dried 'Rose des Alpes, and a scrap of Voltaire's handwriting he had obtained from an old servant of the philosopher at Verney, and posted the souvenir to Victoria. Years later she attested it was 'one of her greatest treasures.

I love that Voltaire was so willing to shock his readers with arbitrary cruelty. And I can completely relate to it.