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Republics come to an end by luxurious habits monarchies by poverty.

Baron de Montesquieu

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Baron de Montesquieu
Habit
Poverty
Monarchies
Economy
Republics
Wisdom
Luxurious
Politics
Monarchy
Ends
Liberalism
Come
Habits
Republic

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The sublimity of administration consists in knowing the proper degree of power that should be exerted on different occasions.
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Knowledge humanizes mankind, and reason inclines to mildness but prejudices eradicate every tender disposition.
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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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Men in excess of happiness or misery are equally inclined to severity. Witness conquerors and monks! It is mediocrity alone, and a mixture of prosperous and adverse fortune that inspire us with lenity and pity.
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In republican governments, men are all equal equal they are also in despotic governments: in the former, because they are everything in the latter, because they are nothing.
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Success in the majority of circumstances depends on knowing how long it takes to succeed.
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The love of study is in us the only lasting passion. All the others quit us in proportion as this miserable machine which holds them approaches its ruins.
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Virtue in a republic is the love of one's country, that is the love of equality.
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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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No kingdom has shed more blood than the kingdom of Christ.
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There is a very good saying that if triangles invented a god, they would make him three-sided.
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Honor is unknown in despotic states.
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The power of divorce can be given only to those who feel the inconveniences of marriage, and who are sensible of the moment when it is for their interest to make them cease.
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Nature is just to all mankind, and repays them for their industry. She renders them industrious by annexing rewards in proportion to their labor.
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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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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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In bodies moved, the motion is received, increased, diminished, or lost, according to the relations of the quantity of matter and velocity each diversity is uniformity, each change is constancy.
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When the legislative and executive powers are united in the same person, or in the same body of magistrates, there can be no liberty because apprehensions may arise, lest the same monarch or senate should enact tyrannical laws, to execute them in a tyrannical manner.
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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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