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Does not vanity itself cease to be blamable, is it not even ennobled, when it is directed to laudable objects, when it confines itself to prompting us to great and generous actions?

Denis Diderot

Skepticism is the first step on the road to philosophy.
DENIS DIDEROT

Philosophy Road
Only passions, and great passions, can raise the soul to great things. Without them there is no sublimity, either in morals or in creativity. Art returns to infancy, and virtue becomes small-minded.
DENIS DIDEROT

Greatness Mindset Moral Passion Raise Small Soul
People praise virtue, but they hate it, they run away from it. It freezes you to death, and in this world you’ve got to keep your feet warm.
DENIS DIDEROT

Anand Thakur
There are three principal means of acquiring knowledge, observation of nature, reflection, and experimentation. Observation collects facts; reflection combines them; experimentation verifies the result of that combination.
DENIS DIDEROT

Combination Experiment Knowledge Principle Reflection Result
The possibility of divorce renders both marriage partners stricter in their observance of the duties they owe to each other. Divorces help to improve morals and to increase the population.
DENIS DIDEROT

Divorce Improvement Marriage Partner Population Possible
I like better for one to say some foolish thing upon important matters than to be silent. That becomes the subject of discussion and dispute, and the truth is discovered.
DENIS DIDEROT

Anand Thakur
Shakespeare’s fault is not the greatest into which a poet may fall. It merely indicates a deficiency of taste.
DENIS DIDEROT

Book Greatness Literature Poet Taste
Philosophy is as far separated from impiety as religion is from fanaticism.
DENIS DIDEROT

Philosophy Religion Separate
Ignorance is less remote from the truth than prejudice.
DENIS DIDEROT

Ignorance Prejudice Remote Truth
If there is one realm in which it is essential to be sublime, it is in wickedness. You spit on a petty thief, but you can’t deny a kind of respect for the great criminal.
DENIS DIDEROT

Essential Kind Respect Wicked Yourself
The wisest among us is very lucky never to have met the woman, be she beautiful or ugly, intelligent or stupid, who could drive him crazy enough to be fit to be put into an asylum.
DENIS DIDEROT

Beautiful Crazy Drive Enough Wisdom Woman
In order to shake a hypothesis, it is sometimes not necessary to do anything more than push it as far as it will go.
DENIS DIDEROT

Necessary Order Shake Willing
We swallow with one gulp the lie that flatters us, and drink drop by drop the truth which is bitter to us.
DENIS DIDEROT

Bitter Lying Swallow Truth
It is said that desire is a product of the will, but the converse is in fact true: will is a product of desire.
DENIS DIDEROT

Desire Fact Production True Willing
I am wholly yours – you are everything to me; we will sustain each other in all the ills of life it may please fate to inflict upon us; you will soothe my troubles; I will comfort you in yours.
DENIS DIDEROT

Each Other Life Trouble Yourself
Justice is the first virtue of those who command, and stops the complaints of those who obey.
DENIS DIDEROT

Command Justice Obedience Virtue

Does not vanity itself cease to be blamable, is it not even ennobled, when it is directed to laudable objects, when it confines itself to prompting us to great and generous actions?

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Does not vanity itself cease to be blamable, is it not even ennobled, when it is directed to laudable objects, when it confines itself to prompting us to great and generous actions?

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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