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We must distinguish between speaking to deceive and being silent to be reserved.
Voltaire
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Voltaire
Age: 84 †
Born: 1694
Born: February 20
Died: 1778
Died: May 30
Author
Autobiographer
Correspondent
Diarist
Encyclopédistes
Essayist
Historian
Philosopher
Playwright
Poet
Poet Lawyer
Political Scientist
Paris
France
François-Marie Arouet
Francois Marie Arouet de Voltaire
Francois Marie Arouet
Dictator of Letters
Silent
Quiet
Must
Deceive
Distinguish
Reserved
Deceiving
Speaking
More quotes by Voltaire
The safest course is to do nothing against one's conscience. With this secret, we can enjoy life and have no fear from death.
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So long as the people do not care to exercise their freedom, those who wish to tyrannize will do so for tyrants are active and ardent, and will devote themselves in the name of any number of gods, religious and otherwise, to put shackles upon sleeping men.
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Every man can educate himself. It's shameful to put one's mind into the hands of those whom you wouldn't entrust with your money. Dare to think for yourself.
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He was my equal in beauty, a paragon of grace and charm, sparkling with wit, and burning with love. I adored him to distraction, to the point of idolatry: I loved him as one can never love twice.
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Those who can be made to believe absurdities can be made to commit atrocities.
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Quand celui à qui l'on parle ne comprend pas et celui qui parle ne se comprend pas, c'est de la métaphysique When he to whom a person speaks does not understand, and he who speaks does not understand himself, that is metaphysics.
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Our priests are not what a silly populace supposes all their learning consists in our credulity.
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One day everything will be well, that is our hope. Everything's fine today, that is our illusion.
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When truth is evident, it is impossible for parties and factions to rise. There never has been a dispute as to whether there is daylight at noon.
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Woe to the makers of literal translations, who by rendering every word weaken the meaning! It is indeed by so doing that we can say the letter kills and the spirit gives life.
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The Bible. That is what fools have written, what imbeciles commend, what rogues teach and young children are made to learn by heart.
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If you wish to converse with me, define your terms.
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There is only one morality, as there is only one geometry.
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Do well and you will have no need for ancestors.
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Poetry is the music of the soul, and, above all, of great and feeling souls.
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Verses which do not teach men new and moving truths do not deserve to be read.
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Even in those cities which seem to enjoy the blessings of peace, and where the arts florish, the inhabitants are devoured by envy, cares and anxieties, which are greater plagues than any expirienced in a town when it is under siege.
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If mankind were born tomorrow it would divide into groups each would scramble to invent their one and only god, and set about butchering each-other.
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Among the illusions which have invested our civilization is an absolute belief that the solutions to our problems must be a more determined application of rationally organized expertise... The reality is that our problems are largely the product of that application.
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If this is the best of possible worlds, what then are the others?
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