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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

Wandering in a vast forest at night, I have only a faint light to guide me. A stranger appears and says to me: ‘My friend, you should blow out your candle in order to find your way more clearly.’ This stranger is a theologian.
DENIS DIDEROT

Finding Forest Night Order Stranger Wander Yourself
To say that man is a compound of strength and weakness, light and darkness, smallness and greatness, is not to indict him, it is to define him.
DENIS DIDEROT

Definition Himself Man Strength Weakness
Two qualities essential for the artist: moralityand perspective.
DENIS DIDEROT

Artist Essential Moral Perspective Quality
The infant runs toward it with its eyes closed, the adult is stationary, the old man approaches it with his back turned.
DENIS DIDEROT

Adult Eyes Infant Man Old
What has not been examined impartially has not been well examined. Skepticism is therefore the first step towards truth.
DENIS DIDEROT

Impartial Path Step Truth
Disturbances in society are never more fearful than when those who are stirring up the trouble can use the pretext of religion to mask their true designs.
DENIS DIDEROT

Design Disturb Trouble True
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
I can be expected to look for truth but not to find it.
DENIS DIDEROT

Expectation Finding Myself Truth
Our observation of nature must be diligent, our reflection profound, and our experiments exact. We rarely see these three means combined; and for this reason, creative geniuses are not common.
DENIS DIDEROT

Creative Experiment Genius Nature Observation
The man who first pronounced the barbarous word God ought to have been immediately destroyed.
DENIS DIDEROT

Destroy Man Pronounce
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

Bad Company Innocent Instruction Loss One Prejudice
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

Enjoyment Heaven Man Nature Reason Receive
In any country where talent and virtue produce no advancement, money will be the national god. Its inhabitants will either have to possess money or make others believe that they do. Wealth will be the highest virtue, poverty the greatest vice.
DENIS DIDEROT

Anand Thakur
The God of the Christians is a father who makes much of his apples, and very little of his children.
DENIS DIDEROT

Children Father God Himself
Instinct guides the animal better than the man. In the animal it is pure, in man it is led astray by his reason and intelligence.
DENIS DIDEROT

Animal Guide Instinct Intelligence Reason
There is only one passion, the passion for happiness.
DENIS DIDEROT

Happiness Oneself Passion

In order to shake a hypothesis, it is sometimes not necessary to do anything more than push it as far as it will go.

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In order to shake a hypothesis, it is sometimes not necessary to do anything more than push it as far as it will go.

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Popular Authors

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