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There is one further distinguishing characteristic of man which is very specific indeed and about which there can be no dispute, and that is the faculty of self-improvement - a faculty which, with the help of circumstance, progressively develops all our other faculties.

Jean-Jacques Rousseau

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Jean-Jacques Rousseau
Age: 66 †
Born: 1712
Born: June 28
Died: 1778
Died: July 2
Autobiographer
Botanist
Choreographer
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Encyclopédistes
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Literary
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Music Theorist
Musicologist
Genève
J. J. Rousseau
Rousseau
Jean Jaques Rousseau
Jean Jeacques Rousseau
John James Rousseau
Johann Jacob Rousseau
Juan Jacobo Rousseau
Jan Jakub Rouseau
Gian Giacomo Rousseau
Lu-so
G. G. Rousseau
Zhan Zhak Russo
Citizen of Geneva
Citoyen de Genève
Jean Jacques
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Improvement
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Indeed
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Let the trumpet of the day of judgment sound when it will, I shall appear with this book in my hand before the Sovereign Judge, and cry with a loud voice, This is my work, there were my thoughts, and thus was I. I have freely told both the good and the bad, have hid nothing wicked, added nothing good.
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For it is in our nature to endure patiently the decrees of fate, but not the ill-will of others.
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As long as there are rich people in the world, they will be desirous of distinguishing themselves from the poor.
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In a well governed state, there are few punishments, not because there are many pardons, but because criminals are rare it is when a state is in decay that the multitude of crimes is a gaurantee of impunity.
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One must choose between making a man or a citizen, for one cannot make both at the same time.
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We are born weak, we need strength helpless, we need aid foolish, we need reason. All that we lack at birth, all that we need when we come to man's estate, is the gift of education.
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Plant and your spouse plants with you weed and you weed alone.
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Anticipation and Hope are born twins.
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The English people think they are free they are greatly deceived they are free only during the election of members of Parliament.
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Provided a man is not mad, he can be cured of every folly but vanity there is no cure for this but experience, if indeed there is any cure for it at all.
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Luxury either comes of riches or makes them necessary it corrupts at once rich and poor, the rich by possession and the poor by covetousness.
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Universal silence is taken to imply the consent of the people.
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Generally we obtain very surely and very speedily what we are not too anxious to obtain.
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There are times when I am so unlike myself that I might be taken for someone else of an entirely opposite character.
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To renounce freedom is to renounce one's humanity, one's rights as a man and equally one's duties.
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We can never put ourselves in the shoes of children we cannot fathom their thoughts, we lend them ours and always following ourown reasoning, we stuff their heads with extravagance and error.
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In all the ills that befall us, we are more concerned by the intention than the result. A tile that falls off a roof may injure us more seriously, but it will not wound us so deeply as a stone thrown deliberately by a malevolent hand. The blow may miss, but the intention always strikes home.
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The taste for splendor is hardly ever combined in the same souls with the taste for the honorable.
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Take from the philosopher the pleasure of being heard and his desire for knowledge ceases.
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Leave those vain moralists, my friend, and return to the depth of your soul: that is where you will always rediscover the source of the sacred fire which so often inflamed us with love of the sublime virtues that is where you will see the eternal image of true beauty, the contemplation of which inspires us with a holy enthusiasm.
Jean-Jacques Rousseau