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En ge ne ral, plus un peuple est civilise , poli, moins ses moeurs sont poe tiques tout s'affaiblit en s'adoucissant. Ingeneral, themore civilized and refinedthepeople, the less poetic are its morals everything weakens as it mellows.

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
Poetic
Civilized
Plus
Moral
Less
Sont
Everything
Tout
Weakens
Morals

More quotes by Denis Diderot

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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.
Denis Diderot
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Although a man may wear fine clothing, if he lives peacefully and is good, self-possessed, has faith and is pure and if he does not hurt any living being, he is a holy man.
Denis Diderot
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Tous les jours on couche avec des femmes qu'on n'aime pas, et l'on ne couche pas avec des femmes qu'on aime. Every day we sleep with women we do not love and don't sleep with the women we do love.
Denis Diderot
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Morals are in all countries the result of legislation and government they are not African or Asian or European: they are good or bad.
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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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.
Denis Diderot
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Integrity is the evidence of all civil virtues.
Denis Diderot
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I feel, I think, I judge therefore, a part of organized matter like me is capable of feeling, thinking, and judging.
Denis Diderot
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Good music is very close to primitive language.
Denis Diderot
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Two qualities essential for the artist: moralityand perspective.
Denis Diderot
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Scepticism is the first step towards truth.
Denis Diderot
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You have to make it happen.
Denis Diderot
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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.
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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The pit of a theatre is the one place where the tears of virtuous and wicked men alike are mingled.
Denis Diderot
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Evil always turns up in this world through some genius or other.
Denis Diderot
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The world is the house of the strong. I shall not know until the end what I have lost or won in this place, in this vast gambling den where I have spent more than sixty years, dice box in hand, shaking the dice.
Denis Diderot
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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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Superstition is more injurious to God than atheism.
Denis Diderot