Voltaire

Philosopher

1694-11-21 – 1778-01-01

Quotes by Voltaire

• By what incomprehensible mechanism are our organs held in subjection to sentiment and thought? How is it that a single melancholy idea shall disturb the whole course of the blood; and that the blood should in turn communicate irregularities to the human understanding? What is that unknown fluid which certainly exists and which, quicker and more active than light, flies in less than the twinkling of an eye into all the channels of life,— produces sensations, memory, joy or grief, reason or frenzy,— recalls with horror what we would choose to forget; and renders a thinking animal, either a subject of admiration, or an object of pity and compassion?

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• All our ancient history, as one of our wits remarked, is no more than accepted fiction.

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• You are very harsh.''I have seen the world.

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• But for what purpose was the earth formed? asked Candide. To drive us mad, replied Martin.

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• The Dutch fetishes who converted me tell me every Sunday that the blacks and whites are all children of one father, whom they call Adam. As for me, I do not understand anything of genealogies; but if what these preachers say is true, we are all second cousins; and you must allow that it is impossible to be worse treated by our relations than we are.

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• Behind every successful man stands a surprised mother-in-law.

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• Don't think money does everything or you are going to end up doing everything for money.

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• Marriage is the only adventure open to the cowardly.

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• Go into the London Stock Exchange – a more respectable place than many a court – and you will see representatives from all nations gathered together for the utility of men. Here Jew, Mohammedan and Christian deal with each other as though they were all of the same faith, and only apply the word infidel to people who go bankrupt. Here the Presbyterian trusts the Anabaptist and the Anglican accepts a promise from the Quaker. On leaving these peaceful and free assemblies some go to the Synagogue and others for a drink, this one goes to be baptized in a great bath in the name of Father, Son and Holy Ghost, that one has his son's foreskin cut and has some Hebrew words he doesn't understand mumbled over the child, others go to heir church and await the inspiration of God with their hats on, and everybody is happy.

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• Our labour preserves us from three great evils -- weariness, vice, and want.

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• Reading nurtures the soul, and an enlightened friend brings it solace.

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• Let us read, and let us dance; these two amusements will never do any harm to the world.

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• If they're from the village, you take them to the inn. If they're from the city, you treat them with respect when they are beautiful and throw them on the highway when they are dead.

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• Candide, who trembled like a philosopher, hid himself as well as he could during this heroic butchery.

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• All men are by nature free; you have therefore an undoubted liberty to depart whenever you please, but will have many and great difficulties to encounter in passing the frontiers.

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• So it is the human condition that to wish for the greatness of one's fatherland is to wish evil to one's neighbors. The citizen of the universe would be the man who wishes his country never to be either greater or smaller, richer or poorer.

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• Such then is the human condition, that to wish greatness for one's country is to wish harm to one's neighbors.

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• What we find in books is like the fire in our hearths. We fetch it from our neighbors, we kindle it at home, we communicate it to others, and it becomes the property of all.

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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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• It is with books as with men: a very small number play a great part.

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