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My friend, you should blow out your candle in order to find your way more clearly.

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
Way
Candle
Clearly
Blow
Friend
Order
Find

More quotes by Denis Diderot

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You risk just as much in being credulous as in being suspicious.
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The fact is that she was terribly undressed and I was extremely undressed too. The fact is that I still had my hand where she didn't have anything and she had hers where the same wasn't quite true of me. The fact is that I found myself underneath her and consequently she found herself on top of me.
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If there were a reason for preferring the Christian religion to natural religion, it would be because the former offers us, on the nature of God and man, enlightenment that the latter lacks. Now, this is not at all the case for Christianity, instead of clarifying, gives rise to an infinite multitude of obscurities and difficulties.
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I discuss with myself questions of politics, love, taste, or philosophy. I let my mind rove wantonly, give it free rein to followany idea, wise or mad that may present itself. My ideas are my harlots.
Denis Diderot
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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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There is no moral precept that does not have something inconvenient about it.
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Evil always turns up in this world through some genius or other.
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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
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Superstition is more injurious to God than atheism.
Denis Diderot
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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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If reason be a gift of Heaven, and we can say as much of faith, Heaven has certainly made us two gifts not only incompatible, but in direct contradiction to each other. In order to solve the difficulty, we are compelled to say either that faith is a chimera or that reason is useless.
Denis Diderot
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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
Denis Diderot
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We swallow greedily any lie that flatters us, but we sip only little by little at a truth we find bitter.
Denis Diderot
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There is no good father who would want to resemble our Heavenly Father.
Denis Diderot
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Integrity is the evidence of all civil virtues.
Denis Diderot
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Justice is the first virtue of those who command, and stops the complaints of those who obey.
Denis Diderot
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The philosopher has never killed any priests, whereas the priest has killed a great many philosophers.
Denis Diderot
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No man has received from nature the right to command his fellow human beings.
Denis Diderot
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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.
Denis Diderot
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There is only one virtue, justice only one duty, to be happy only one corollary, not to overvalue life and not to fear death.
Denis Diderot