Liberty is the right of doing whatever the laws permit.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEUThe 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.
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.
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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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To love to read is to exchange hours of ennui for hours of delight.
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A really intelligent man feels what other men only know.
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Life was given to me as a favor, so I may abandon it when it is one no longer.
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I have ever held it as a maxim never to do that through another which it was impossible for me to execute myself.
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Laws undertake to punish only overt acts.
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The history of commerce is that of the communication of the people.
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Love of reading enables a man to exchange the weary hours, which come to every one, for hours of delight.
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The public business must be carried on with a certain motion, neither too quick nor too slow.
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There is only one thing that can form a bond between men, and that is gratitude… we cannot give someone else greater power over us than we have ourselves.
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Friendship is an arrangement by which we undertake to exchange small favors for big ones.
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The life of man is but a succession of vain hopes and groundless fears.
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I suffer from the disease of writing books and being ashamed of them when they are finished.
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What unhappy beings men are! They constantly waver between false hopes and silly fears, and instead of relying on reason they create monsters to frighten themselves with, and phantoms which lead them astray.
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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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The love of study is in us the only lasting passion. All the others quit us in proportion as this miserable machine which holds them approaches its ruins.
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If I knew of something that could serve my nation but would ruin another, I would not propose it to my prince, for I am first a man and only then a Frenchman… because I am necessarily a man, and only accidentally am I French.
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Democracy is corrupted not only when the spirit of equality is corrupted, but likewise when they fall into a spirit of extreme equality.
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Political liberty is to be found only in moderate governments.
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In the birth of societies it is the chiefs of states who give it its special character; and afterward it is this special character that forms the chiefs of state.
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There is hardly any grief that an hour’s reading will not dissipate.
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When we seek after wit, we discover only foolishness.
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Christianity stamped its character on jurisprudence; for empire has ever a connection with the priesthood.
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There is a very good saying that if triangles invented a god, they would make him three-sided.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU