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True greatness consists in the use of a powerful understanding to enlighten oneself and others.
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
Greatness
Oneself
Powerful
Understanding
Use
Enlighten
Others
Enlightening
True
Consists
Enlightenment
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When we cannot use the compass of mathematics or the torch of experience...it is certain we cannot take a single step forward.
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The art of government is to make two-thirds of a nation pay all it possibly can pay for the benefit of the other third.
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History is only the pattern of silken slippers descending the stairs to the thunder of hobnailed boots climbing upward from below.
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If there were only one religion in England there would be danger of despotism, if there were two, they would cut each other's throats, but there are thirty, and they live in peace and happiness.
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Time, which alone makes the reputation of men, ends by making their defects respectable.
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Needless to say since Christ's expiation not one single Christian has been known to sin, or die.
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Will is wish, and liberty is power.
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Work is often the father of pleasure.
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If there are atheists, who is to be blamed if not the mercenary tyrants of souls who, in revolting us against their swindles, compel some feeble spirits to deny the God whom these monsters dishonour?
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It is dangerous to be right in matters where established men are wrong.
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Twenty-volume folios will never make a revolution. It’s the little pocket pamphlets that are to be feared.
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I know many books which have bored their readers, but I know of none which has done real evil.
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What can we say with certainty?
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The more you know, the less sure you are.
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No opinion is worth burning your neighbor for.
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And ask each passenger to tell his story, and if there is one of them all who has not cursed his existence many times, and said to himself over and over again that he was the most miserable of men, I give you permission to throw me head-first into the sea.
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Ice-cream is exquisite - what a pity it isn't illegal.
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Go get yourself crucified and then rise on the third day.
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