It is unreasonable … to oblige a man not to attempt the defense of his own life.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEULiberty itself has appeared intolerable to those nations who have not been accustomed to enjoy it.
More Baron de Montesquieu Quotes
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Coffee renders many foolish people temporarily capable of wise actions
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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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A rational army would run away.
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Laws, in their most general signification, are the necessary relations arising from the nature of things. In this sense all beings have their laws: the Deity His laws, the material world its laws, the intelligences superior to man their laws, the beasts their laws, man his laws.
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The wickedness of mankind makes it necessary for the law to suppose them better than they really are.
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The prejudices of superstition are superior to all others, and have the strongest influence on the human mind.
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An injustice to one is a threat made to all
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Every man who has power is impelled to abuse it.
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Great commanders write their actions with simplicity; because they receive more glory from facts than from words.
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The English are busy folk; they have no time in which to be polite.
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With truths of a certain kind, it is not enough to make them appear convincing: one must also make them felt. Of such kind are moral truths.
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Useless laws weaken the necessary laws.
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It is difficult for the united states to be all of equal power and extent.
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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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In bodies moved, the motion is received, increased, diminished, or lost, according to the relations of the quantity of matter and velocity; each diversity is uniformity, each change is constancy.
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As virtue is necessary in a republic, and honor in a monarchy, fear is what is required in a despotism. As for virtue, it is not at all necessary, and honor would be dangerous there.
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I have never known any distress that an hour’s reading did not relieve.
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Virtue in a republic is the love of one’s country, that is the love of equality.
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The laws do not take upon them to punish any other than overt acts.
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There is hardly any grief that an hour’s reading will not dissipate.
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Power should be a check on power.
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Europe is a state with several provinces
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The incomparable stupidity of life teaches us to love our parents; divine philosophy teaches us to forgive them.
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I have read descriptions of Paradise that would make any sensible person stop wanting to go there.
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It is clear that in a monarchy, where he who commands the exceution of the laws generally thinks himself above them, there is lessneed of virtue than in a popular government, where the person entrusted with the execution of the laws is sensible of his being subject to their direction.
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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.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU