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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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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
Earth
Tower
Firsts
Towers
First
Plain
Sky
Distance
Infinite
Madder
Building
Inhabitants
Stop
Separating

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The infant runs toward it with its eyes closed, the adult is stationary, the old man approaches it with his back turned.
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Le public ne sait pas toujours de sirer le vrai. Thepublicdoesnot alwaysknowhow todesirethetruth.
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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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There is only one virtue, justice only one duty, to be happy only one corollary, not to overvalue life and not to fear death.
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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.
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Skepticism is the first step on the road to philosophy.
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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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The blood of Jesus Christ can cover a multitude of sins, it seems to me.
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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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There's a bit of testicle at the bottom of our most sublime feelings and our purest tenderness.
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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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All things must be examined, debated, investigated without exception and without regard for anyone's feelings.
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They mistake the first manifestations of a developing sexual nature for the voice of God calling them to Himself and it is precisely when nature is inciting them that they embrace a fashion of life contrary to nature's wish.
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He whom we call a gentleman is no longer the man of Nature.
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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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How easy it is to tell tales!
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I can be expected to look for truth but not to find it.
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There is no good father who would want to resemble our Heavenly Father.
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