Law in general is human reason, inasmuch as it governs all the inhabitants of the earth: the political and civil laws of each nation ought to be only the particular cases in which human reason is applied.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEUFalse happiness renders men stern and proud, and that happiness is never communicated. True happiness renders them kind and sensible, and that happiness is always shared.
More Baron de Montesquieu Quotes
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When one wants to change manners and customs, one should not do so by changing the laws.
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Lunch kills half of Paris, supper the other half.
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What orators lack in depth they make up for in length.
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Honor is unknown in despotic states.
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Peace is a natural effect of trade.
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Sometimes a man who deserves to be looked upon because he is a fool is despised only because he is a lawyer.
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Democracy has two excesses to avoid: the spirit of inequality, which leads to an aristocracy, or to the government of a single individual; and the spirit of extreme equality, which conducts it to despotism, as the despotism of a single individual finishes by conquest.
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Republics come to an end by luxurious habits; monarchies by poverty.
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A fondness for reading changes the inevitable dull hours of our life into exquisite hours of delight.
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The reason the Romans built their great paved highways was because they had such inconvenient footwear.
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Laws undertake to punish only overt acts.
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The spirit of moderation should also be the spirit of the lawgiver.
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Those who have few affairs to attend to are great speakers. The less men think, the more they talk.
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But constant experience shows us that every man invested with power is apt to abuse it, and to carry his authority as far as it will go.
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The crime against nature will never make any great progress in society unless people are prompted to it by some particular custom.
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An author is a fool who, not content with boring those he lives with, insists on boring future generations.
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In every government there are three sorts of power: the legislative; the executive in respect to things dependent on the law of nations; and the executive in regard to matters that depend on the civil law.
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What cowardice it is to be dismayed by the happiness of others and devastated by there good fortune.
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I shall be obliged to wander to the right and to the left, that I may investigate and discover the truth.
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When the legislative and executive powers are united in the same person, or in the same body of magistrates, there can be no liberty; because apprehensions may arise, lest the same monarch or senate should enact tyrannical laws, to execute them in a tyrannical manner.
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Men should be bewailed at their birth, and not at their death.
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Power ought to serve as a check to power.
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The less men think, the more they talk.
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False happiness renders men stern and proud, and that happiness is never communicated. True happiness renders them kind and sensible, and that happiness is always shared.
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The severity of the laws prevents their execution.
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It is rare to find learned men who are clean, do not stink and have a sense of humour.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU