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At our coming into the world we contract an immense debt to our country, which we can never discharge.

Baron de Montesquieu

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Baron de Montesquieu
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More quotes by Baron de Montesquieu

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Law should be like death, which spares no one.
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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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Law in general is human reason, inasmuch as it governs all the inhabitants of the earth: the political and civil laws of each nation ought to be only the particular cases in which human reason is applied.
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There is hardly any grief that an hour's reading will not dissipate.
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As virtue is necessary in a republic, and honor in a monarchy, fear is what is required in a despotism. As for virtue, it is not at all necessary, and honor would be dangerous there.
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Experience constantly proves that every man who has power is impelled to abuse it he goes on till he is pulled up by some limits. Who would say it! virtue even has need of limits.
Baron de Montesquieu
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Every man who has power is impelled to abuse it.
Baron de Montesquieu
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Republics end through luxury monarchies through poverty.
Baron de Montesquieu
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A fondness for reading changes the inevitable dull hours of our life into exquisite hours of delight.
Baron de Montesquieu
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Laws, in their most general signification, are the necessary relations derived from the nature of things.
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I never listen to calumnies, because if they are untrue I run the risk of being deceived, and if they be true, of hating persons not worth thinking about.
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What unhappy beings men are! They constantly waver between false hopes and silly fears, and instead of relying on reason they create monsters to frighten themselves with, and phantoms which lead them astray.
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We ought to be very cautious and circumspect in the prosecution of magic and heresy. The attempt to put down these two crimes may be extremely perilous to liberty.
Baron de Montesquieu
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As men are affected in all ages by the same passions, the occasions which bring about great changes are different, but the causes are always the same.
Baron de Montesquieu
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Honor sets all the parts of the body politic in motion, and by its very action connects them thus each individual advances the public good, while he only thinks of promoting his own interest.
Baron de Montesquieu
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When the [law making] and [law enforcement] powers are united in the same person... there can be no liberty.
Baron de Montesquieu
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There is still another inconvenieney in conquests made by democracies their government is ever odious to the conquered states. It is apparently monarchical, but in reality it is more oppressive than monarchy, as the experience of all ages and countries evinces.
Baron de Montesquieu
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When the savages of Louisiana wish to have fruit, they cut the tree at the bottom and gather the fruit. That is exactly a despotic government.
Baron de Montesquieu
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Certain kinds of foolishness are such that a greater foolishness would be better.
Baron de Montesquieu
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Men, who are rogues individually, are in the mass very honorable people.
Baron de Montesquieu