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The general interest of the masses might take the place of the insight of genius if it were allowed freedom of action.

Denis Diderot

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Denis Diderot
Age: 70 †
Born: 1713
Born: October 5
Died: 1784
Died: July 31
Abbé
Art Critic
Art Theorist
Correspondent
Encyclopédistes
Essayist
Historian
Lexicographer
Literary Critic
Literary Theorist
Lumières
Diderot
Take
Mass
General
Genius
Interest
Freedom
Action
Masses
Place
Insight
Might
Allowed

More quotes by Denis Diderot

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What is a monster? A being whose survival is incompatible with the existing order.
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When shall we see poets born? After a time of disasters and great misfortunes, when harrowed nations begin to breathe again. And then, shaken by the terror of such spectacles, imaginations will paint things entirely strange to those who have not witnessed them.
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The bad gives rise to the good, the good inspires the better, the better produces the excellent, the excellent is followed by the bizarre
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The Christian religion teaches us to imitate a God that is cruel, insidious, jealous, and implacable in his wrath.
Denis Diderot
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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.
Denis Diderot
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What has not been examined impartially has not been well examined. Skepticism is therefore the first step towards truth.
Denis Diderot
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At an early age I sucked up the milk of Homer, Virgil, Horace, Terence, Anacreon, Plato and Euripides, diluted with that of Moses and the prophets.
Denis Diderot
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And his hands would plait the priest's entrails, For want of a rope, to strangle kings.
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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.
Denis Diderot
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In general, children, like men, and men, like children, prefer entertainment to education.
Denis Diderot
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La poe sie veutquelque chose d'e norme, debarbare et de sauvage. Poetry needs something on the scale of the grand, the barbarous, the savage.
Denis Diderot
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It is not the man who is beside himself, but he who is cool and collected,--who is master of his countenance, of his voice, of his actions, of his gestures, of every part of his play,--who can work upon others at his pleasure.
Denis Diderot
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All things must be examined, debated, investigated without exception and without regard for anyone's feelings.
Denis Diderot
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Only God and some few rare geniuses can keep forging ahead into novelty.
Denis Diderot
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To say that man is a compound of strength and weakness, light and darkness, smallness and greatness, is not to indict him, it is to define him.
Denis Diderot
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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.
Denis Diderot
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Good music is very close to primitive language.
Denis Diderot
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Are we not madder than those first inhabitants of the plain of Sennar? We know that the distance separating the earth from the sky is infinite, and yet we do not stop building our tower.
Denis Diderot
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A thing is not proved because no one has ever questioned it... Skepticism is the first step toward truth.
Denis Diderot
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No man has received from nature the right to give orders to others. Freedom is a gift from heaven, and every individual of the same species has the right to enjoy it as soon as he is in enjoyment of his reason.
Denis Diderot