Quotes About Responsibility

I discovered from my time in the brothel that men's members, if bitten off or otherwise severed, do not grow again. This seems a great mistake on the part of nature, since men are so careless with their members and will put them anywhere without thinking.

As soon as any man says of the affairs of the State What does it matter to me? the State may be given up for lost.

To renounce liberty is to renounce being a man, to surrender the rights of humanity and even its duties.

Nature made me happy and good, and if I am otherwise, it is society's fault.

A child who passes through many hands in turn, can never be well brought up. At every change he makes a secret comparison, which continually tends to lessen his respect for those who control him, and with it their authority over him. If once he thinks there are grown-up people with no more sense than children the authority of age is destroyed and his education is ruined.

To renounce freedom is to renounce one's humanity, one's rights as a man and equally one's duties.

Man's first law is to watch over his own preservation; his first care he owes to himself; and as soon as he reaches the age of reason, he becomes the only judge of the best means to preserve himself; he becomes his own master.

He who blushes is already guilty.

If force compels obedience, there is no need to invoke a duty to obey, and if force ceases to compel obedience, there is no longer any obligation.

We may add that frequent punishments are always a sign of weakness or remissness on the part of the government. There is not a single ill-doer who could not be turned to some good. The State has no right to put to death, even for the sake of making an example, any one whom it can leave alive without danger.

Born as I was the citizen of a free state and a member of its sovereign body, the very right to vote imposes on me the duty to instruct myself in public affairs, however little influence my voice may have in them.

It is a great evil for a Chief of a nation to be born the enemy of the freedom whose defender he should be.

Ah,' thought the king sadly, shrugging his shoulders, I see clearly that if one has a crazy wife, one cannot avoid being a fool.' (Queen Fantasque)

We cannot teach children the danger of lying to men without feeling as men, the greater danger of lying to children.

Le plus fort n'est jamais assez fort pour être toujours le maître, s'il ne transforme sa force en droit et l'obéissance en devoir.

When a man is set in authority over others, everything conspires to rob him of his sense of justice and reason.

Renoncer à sa liberté c'est renoncer à sa qualité d'homme, aux droits de l'humanité, même à ses devoirs.

he ahí las pruebas funestas de que la mayor parte de nuestros males son obra nuestra

las fatigas y el agotamiento espiritual, los pesares y contrariedades que se sienten en todas las situaciones, los cuales corroen perpetuamente el alma: he ahí las pruebas funestas de que la mayor parte de nuestros males son obra nuestra

Aprovechemos el contento de espíritu cuando acude. Guardémonos de alejarlo por nuestra culpa, pero no hagamos proyectos para encadenarlo, pues que tales proyectos son puras locuras.

I may be asked whether I am a prince or a legislator that I should be writing about politics. I answer no: and indeed that is my reason for doing so. If I were a prince or a legislator I should not waste my time saying what ought to be done; I should do it or keep silent.

Cuando cada cual tiene su quehacer, nadie habla sino cuando tiene algo que decir; pero cuando no se hace nada, es forzoso estar hablando siempre; y he ahí la más incómoda y peligrosa de todas las sujeciones.

Su principal deber es procurar su propia conservación, sus principales cuidados son los que se debe a sí mismo; y después que adquiere uso de razón, siendo él sólo el juez de los medios propios para conservarse, llega a ser por este motivo su propio dueño.

Es, pues, la familia, si así se quiere, el primer modelo de las sociedades políticas: el jefe es la imagen del padre, y el pueblo es la imagen de los hijos; y habiendo nacido todos iguales y libres, sólo enajenan su libertad por su utilidad misma.