The deterioration of every government begins with the decay of the principles on which it was founded.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEUThis punishment of death is the remedy, as it were, of a sick society.
More Baron de Montesquieu Quotes
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Wherever I find envy I take a pleasure in provoking it: I always praise before an envious man those who make him grow pale.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
I have ever held it as a maxim never to do that through another which it was impossible for me to execute myself.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
It is requisite the government be so constituted as one man need not be afraid of another.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
Christianity stamped its character on jurisprudence; for empire has ever a connection with the priesthood.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
The alms given to a naked man in the street do not fulfil the obligations of the state, which owes to every citizen a certain subsistence, a proper nourishment, convenient clothing, and a kind of life not incompatible with health.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
To love to read is to exchange hours of ennui for hours of delight.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
When a government lasts a long while, it deteriorates by insensible degrees. Republics end through luxury, monarchies through poverty.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
A really intelligent man feels what other men only know.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
Happy the people whose annals are tiresome.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
The false notion of miracles comes of our vanity, which makes us believe we are important enough for the Supreme Being to upset nature on our behalf.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
As soon as man enters into a state of society he loses the sense of his weakness; equality ceases, and then commences the state of war.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
There is no crueler tyranny than that which is perpetuated under the shield of law and in the name of justice.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
Injustice towards others is a threat to everybody
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
Nature is just to all mankind, and repays them for their industry. She renders them industrious by annexing rewards in proportion to their labor.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
When one wants to change manners and customs, one should not do so by changing the laws.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
It is not the young people that degenerate; they are not spoiled till those of mature age are already sunk into corruption.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
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.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
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.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
Man, as a physical being, is like other bodies governed by invariable laws.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
The crime against nature will never make any great progress in society unless people are prompted to it by some particular custom.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
It is necessary from the very nature of things that power should be a check to power.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
Honor sets all the parts of the body politic in motion, and by its very action connects them; thus each individual advances the public good, while he only thinks of promoting his own interest.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
The harshest tyranny is that which acts under the protection of legality and the banner of justice.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
Man is a social animal formed to please in society.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
When a government is arrived to that degree of corruption as to be incapable of reforming itself, it would not lose much by being new moulded.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
We receive three educations, one from our parents, one from our school-masters, and one from the world. The third contradicts all that the first two teach us.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU