It is requisite the government be so constituted as one man need not be afraid of another.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEUThere is no crueler tyranny than that which is perpetuated under the shield of law and in the name of justice.
More Baron de Montesquieu Quotes
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Slavery, properly so called, is the establishment of a right which gives to one man such a power over another as renders him absolute master of his life and fortune.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
Each particular society begins to feel its strength, whence arises a state of war between different nations.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
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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The less luxury there is in a republic, the more it is perfect.
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Not to be loved is a misfortune, but it is an insult to be loved no longer.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
When the savages of Louisiana wish to have fruit, they cut the tree at the bottom and gather the fruit. That is exactly a despotic government.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
When the body of the people is possessed of the supreme power, it is called a democracy.
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 -
There is as yet no liberty if the power of judging be not separated from legislative power and the executrix
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Men, who are rogues individually, are in the mass very honorable people.
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In the state of nature… all men are born equal, but they cannot continue in this equality. Society makes them lose it, and they recover it only by the protection of the law.
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No kingdom has shed more blood than the kingdom of Christ.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
The prejudices of superstition are superior to all others, and have the strongest influence on the human mind.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
Vanity and pride of nations; vanity is as advantageous to a government as pride is dangerous.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
I acknowledge that history is full of religious wars: but we must distinguish; it is not the multiplicity of religions which has produced these wars; it was the intolerating spirit which animated that one which thought she had the power of governing.
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[The Pope] will make the king believe that three are only one, that the bread he eats is not bread… and a thousand other things of the same kind.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
The power of divorce can be given only to those who feel the inconveniences of marriage, and who are sensible of the moment when it is for their interest to make them cease.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
The state of slavery is in its own nature bad.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
In the infancy of societies, the chiefs of state shape its institutions; later the institutions shape the chiefs of state.
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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 -
In a republic there is no coercive force as in other governments, the laws must therefore endeavor to supply this defect.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
There is no nation so powerful, as the one that obeys its laws not from principals of fear or reason, but from passion.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
Lunch kills half of Paris, supper the other half.
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I never listen to calumnies, because if they are untrue I run the risk of being deceived, and if they be true, of hating persons not worth thinking about.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
Love of reading enables a man to exchange the weary hours, which come to every one, for hours of delight.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
Better it is to say that the government most comfortable to nature is that which best agrees with the humor and disposition of the people in whose favor it is established.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU