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Disturbances in society are never more fearful than when those who are stirring up the trouble can use the pretext of religion to mask their true designs.

Denis Diderot

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Denis Diderot
Age: 70 †
Born: 1713
Born: October 5
Died: 1784
Died: July 31
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Art Critic
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Diderot
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Disturbances
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There is no good father who would want to resemble our Heavenly Father.
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If the weather is too cold or rainy, I take shelter in the Regence Cafe, where I entertain myself by watching chess being played. Paris is the world center, and this cafe is the Paris centre for the finest skill at this game.
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We are far more liable to catch the vices than the virtues of our associates.
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The world is the house of the strong.
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But if you will recall the history of our civil troubles, you will see half the nation bathe itself, out of piety, in the blood of the other half, and violate the fundamental feelings of humanity in order to sustain the cause of God: as though it were necessary to cease to be a man in order to prove oneself religious!
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Anyone who takes it upon himself, on his private authority, to break a bad law, thereby authorizes everyone else to break the good ones.
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To describe women, the pen should be dipped in the humid colors of the rainbow, and the paper dried with the dust gathered from the wings of a butterfly.
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Time, matter, space - all, it may be, are no more than a point.
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Which is the greater merit, to enlighten the human race, which remains forever, or to save one's fatherland, which is perishable?
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Every man has his dignity. I'm willing to forget mine, but at my own discretion and not when someone else tells me to.
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If there are one hundred thousand damned souls for one saved soul, the devil has always the advantage without having given up his son to death.
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You can be sure that a painter reveals himself in his work as much as and more than a writer does in his.
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All things must be examined, debated, investigated without exception and without regard for anyone's feelings... We must run roughshod over all these ancient puerilities, overturn the barriers that reason never erected, give back to the arts and sciences the liberty that is so precious to them.
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He whom we call a gentleman is no longer the man of Nature.
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What is a monster? A being whose survival is incompatible with the existing order.
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Do you see this egg? With this you can topple every theological theory, every church or temple in the world.
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Le public ne sait pas toujours de sirer le vrai. Thepublicdoesnot alwaysknowhow todesirethetruth.
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Power acquired by violence is only a usurpation, and lasts only as long as the force of him who commands prevails over that of those who obey.
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When superstition is allowed to perform the task of old age in dulling the human temperament, we can say goodbye to all excellence in poetry, in painting, and in music.
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Only a very bad theologian would confuse the certainty that follows revelation with the truths that are revealed. They are entirely different things.
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