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I have always observed that to succeed in the world one should seem a fool, but be wise.

Baron de Montesquieu

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Baron de Montesquieu
Success
Seems
Always
Observed
World
Philosophical
Succeed
Fool
Seem
Wise

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Life was given to me as a favor, so I may abandon it when it is one no longer.
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If the triangles made a god, they would give him three sides.
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An empire founded by war has to maintain itself by war.
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When one wants to change manners and customs, one should not do so by changing the laws.
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Raillery is a mode of speaking in favor of one's wit at the expense of one's better nature.
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I have ever held it as a maxim never to do that through another which it was impossible for me to execute myself
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I have never known any distress that an hour's reading did not relieve.
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Political liberty in a citizen is that tranquillity of spirit which comes from the opinion each one has of his security, and in order for him to have this liberty the government must be such that one citizen cannot fear another citizen.
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It is always the adventurous who accomplish great things.
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Democracy has two excesses to avoid: the spirit of inequality, which leads to an aristocracy, or to the government of a single individual and the spirit of extreme equality, which conducts it to despotism, as the despotism of a single individual finishes by conquest.
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That anyone who possesses power has a tendency to abuse it is an eternal truth. They tend to go as far as the barriers will allow.
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It is necessary from the very nature of things that power should be a check to power.
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There should be weeping at a man's birth, not at his death.
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Love of the republic in a democracy, is a love of the democracy love of the democracy is that of equality. Love of the democracy is likewise that of frugality.
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It is clear that in a monarchy, where he who commands the exceution of the laws generally thinks himself above them, there is lessneed of virtue than in a popular government, where the person entrusted with the execution of the laws is sensible of his being subject to their direction.
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Knowledge humanizes mankind, and reason inclines to mildness but prejudices eradicate every tender disposition.
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The state is the association of men, and not men themselves the citizen may perish, and the man remain.
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Laws undertake to punish only overt acts.
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At our coming into the world we contract an immense debt to our country, which we can never discharge.
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Every man who has power is impelled to abuse it.
Baron de Montesquieu