Voltaire quotes
Voltaire (1694–1778): French writer, historian and philosopher. The library holds 99 quotes by Voltaire, drawn from In mockery of Leibnitz’s optimism. The 60 below are the most quoted; search the library in the maker for the rest.
Often about: life, faith, knowledge, nature, art, creativity
The best-known Voltaire quotes
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The opportunity to do mischief is found a hundred times a day, and that of doing good once a year.
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The secret of tiring is to say everything that can be said on the subject.
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All sects are different, because they come from men; morality is everywhere the same, because it comes from God.
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Poetry is the music of the soul; and, above all, of great and feeling souls.
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How dear is fatherland to all noble hearts.
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The discovery of what is true, and the practice of that which is good, are the two most important objects of philosophy.
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One must quit life as one does a banquet, thanking the host and packing up one’s belongings.
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Self-love is a balloon inflated with wind, from which storms burst forth when one makes a puncture in it.
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When one has lost everything and has no more any hope, it is a disgrace to live and a duty to die.
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We cannot always oblige, but we can always speak obligingly.
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I am like enough to the weathercocks, which don’t veer only when they become rusty.
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Use, do not abuse; neither abstinence nor excess ever renders man happy.
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Character is what Nature has engraven on us; can we then efface it?
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Fanaticism, to which men are so much inclined, has always served not only to render them more brutalized but more wicked.
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The history of human opinion is scarcely anything more than the history of human errors.
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Some who are eclipsed in the first rank may shine in the second.
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Men use thought only to justify their unjust acts, and employ speech only to disguise their thoughts.
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The path of genius is not less obstructed with disappointment than that of ambition.
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Every nation has its own language as well as its own temperament.
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The punishment of criminals should be of use; when a man is hanged he is good for nothing.
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He is a hard man who is only just, and he a sad man who is only wise.
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If a God did not exist, it would be necessary to invent one.
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The pursuit of what is true and the practice of what is good are the two most important objects of philosophy.
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I very much fear that our little terraqueous globe is the lunatic asylum of the universe.
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What a heavy burden is a name that has become too soon famous!
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One dies twice: to cease to live is nothing, but to cease to love and to be loved is an insupportable death.
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Virtue is everywhere the same; the reason is it proceeds from God, and the rest is from men.
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The more we have read, the more we have learned, the more we have meditated, the better conditioned we are to affirm that we know nothing.
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Satire lies about men of letters during their lives, and eulogy after their death.
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Without philosophy we should be little above the lower animals.
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When he to whom a man speaks does not understand, and he who speaks does not understand himself, that is metaphysics.
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Fanaticism is to superstition what delirium is to fever and rage to anger.
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Fortune! There is no fortune; all is trial, or punishment, or recompense, or foresight.
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The passions are the winds that fill the sails of the ship; they sometimes sink it, but without them it could not make any way.
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The right of commanding is no longer an advantage transmitted by nature like an inheritance; it is the fruit of labors, the price of courage.
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How I like the boldness of the English; how I like the people who say what they think!
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One of the chief misfortunes of honest people is that they are cowardly.
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He who has not the spirit of his time has all the misery of it.
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All the makers of dictionaries, all the compilers of opinions already printed, we may term plagiarists, but honest plagiarists, who arrogate not the merit of invention.
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With us all is inconsistency. France, seriously speaking, is the country of wit and folly, of industry and idleness, of philosophy and fanaticism, of gaiety and pedantry, laws and their abuses, good taste and impertinence.
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It is with books as with men: a very small number play a great part; the rest are confounded with the multitude.
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Men are in general so tricky, so envious, and so cruel, that when we find one who is only weak, we are too happy.
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Self-love is a balloon blown up with wind, from which tempests of passion issue as soon as it is pricked into.
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Ideas are like beards; men do not have them until they grow up.
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One of the greatest misfortunes of worthy people is that they are cowards.
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Liberty, an amiable guest, puts both her elbows upon the table, i.e., is free and at her ease.
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The multiplicity of facts and writings is become so great, that everything must soon be reduced to extracts.
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Love is a canvas furnished by Nature and embroidered by imagination.
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He who is only just is stern; he who is only wise lives in gloom.
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In the judgments of people there is often little more than self-deception, fashion, and whim.
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He who dies before many witnesses always does so with courage.
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The secret of making one’s self tiresome is not to know when to stop.
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When neither he to whom we speak nor he who speaks to us understands, that is metaphysics.
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The secret of boring people is saying all that can be said on a subject.
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Perfection is attained by slow degrees; she requires the hand of time.
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Virtue is everywhere the same, because it comes from God, while everything else is of men.
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Life is thick sown with thorns, and I know no other remedy than to pass quickly through them. The longer we dwell on our misfortunes the greater is their power to harm us.
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All men are equal; it is not birth, it is virtue alone that makes the difference.
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I die adoring God, loving my friends, not hating my enemies, and detesting superstition.
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Whoever serves his country well has no need of ancestors.