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Gaiety is a quality of ordinary men. Genius always presupposes some disorder in the machine.

Denis Diderot

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
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
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

Control Order People Yourself
The philosopher has never killed any priests, whereas the priest has killed a great many philosophers.
DENIS DIDEROT

Anand Thakur
Superstition is more injurious to God than atheism.
DENIS DIDEROT

Atheist God Injurious
The decisions of law courts should never be printed: in the long run, they form a counter authority to the law.
DENIS DIDEROT

Anand Thakur
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
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
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

Build Distance Infinite Mad Plain Separate Tower
You can be sure that a painter reveals himself in his work as much as and more than a writer does in his.
DENIS DIDEROT

Himself Paint Reveal Writing
Only the bad man is alone.
DENIS DIDEROT

Alone Bad Man
I have not the hope of being immortal, because the desire of it has not given me that vanity.
DENIS DIDEROT

Desire Hope Immortal Myself
If ever anybody dedicated his whole life to the “enthusiasm for truth and justice” using this phrase in the good sense it was Diderot.
DENIS DIDEROT

Dedication Enthusiasm Goodness Life Sense
There is no true sovereign except the nation; there can be no true legislator except the people.
DENIS DIDEROT

Anand Thakur
If you want me to believe in God, you must make me touch him.
DENIS DIDEROT

Believe God Himself Touch
First move me, astonish me, break my heart, let me tremble, weep, stare, be enraged-only then regale my eyes.
DENIS DIDEROT

Astonishment Eyes Move Myself

Gaiety is a quality of ordinary men. Genius always presupposes some disorder in the machine.

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Gaiety is a quality of ordinary men. Genius always presupposes some disorder in the machine.

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Popular Authors

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