What a fine comedy this world would be if one did not play a part in it.
DENIS DIDEROTEvery man has his dignity. I’m willing to forget mine, but at my own discretion and not when someone else tells me to.
More Denis Diderot Quotes
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All abstract sciences are nothing but the study of relations between signs.
DENIS DIDEROT -
Gratitude is a burden, and every burden is made to be shaken off.
DENIS DIDEROT -
Watch out for the fellow who talks about putting things in order! Putting things in order always means getting other people under your control.
DENIS DIDEROT -
There is only one virtue, justice; only one duty, to be happy; only one corollary, not to overvalue life and not to fear death.
DENIS DIDEROT -
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 -
And his hands would plait the priest’s entrails, For want of a rope, to strangle kings.
DENIS DIDEROT -
Gaiety is a quality of ordinary men. Genius always presupposes some disorder in the machine.
DENIS DIDEROT -
Are we not madder than those first inhabitants of the plain of Sennar? We know that the distance separating the earth from the sky is infinite, and yet we do not stop building our tower.
DENIS DIDEROT -
When we know to read our own hearts, we acquire wisdom of the heartsof others.
DENIS DIDEROT -
There are things I can’t force. I must adjust. There are times when the greatest change needed is a change of my viewpoint.
DENIS DIDEROT -
Morals are in all countries the result of legislation and government; they are not African or Asian or European: they are good or bad.
DENIS DIDEROT -
Bad company is as instructive as licentiousness. One makes up for the loss of one’s innocence with the loss of one’s prejudices.
DENIS DIDEROT -
Integrity is the evidence of all civil virtues.
DENIS DIDEROT -
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 -
At an early age I sucked up the milk of Homer, Virgil, Horace, Terence, Anacreon, Plato and Euripides, diluted with that of Moses and the prophets.
DENIS DIDEROT -
Time, matter, space – all, it may be, are no more than a point.
DENIS DIDEROT -
No man has received from nature the right to give orders to others. Freedom is a gift from heaven, and every individual of the same species has the right to enjoy it as soon as he is in enjoyment of his reason.
DENIS DIDEROT -
Ignorance is less remote from the truth than prejudice.
DENIS DIDEROT -
In order to get as much fame as one’s father one has to much more able than he.
DENIS DIDEROT -
Superstition is more injurious to God than atheism.
DENIS DIDEROT -
Give, but, if possible, spare the poor man the shame of begging.
DENIS DIDEROT -
In general, children, like men, and men, like children, prefer entertainment to education.
DENIS DIDEROT -
Philosophy is as far separated from impiety as religion is from fanaticism.
DENIS DIDEROT -
No man has received from nature the right to command his fellow human beings.
DENIS DIDEROT -
The pit of a theatre is the one place where the tears of virtuous and wicked men alike are mingled.
DENIS DIDEROT -
There is only one passion, the passion for happiness.
DENIS DIDEROT