What orators lack in depth they make up for in length.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEURaillery is a mode of speaking in favor of one’s wit at the expense of one’s better nature.
More Baron de Montesquieu Quotes
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It is always the adventurers who do great things, not the sovereigns of great empires.
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Injustice towards others is a threat to everybody
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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.
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If the triangles made a god, they would give him three sides.
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Christianity stamped its character on jurisprudence; for empire has ever a connection with the priesthood.
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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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Happy the people whose annals are tiresome.
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Republics end through luxury; monarchies through poverty.
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Oh, how empty is praise when it reflects back to its origin!
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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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There are only two cases in which war is just: first, in order to resist the aggression of an enemy, and second, in order to help an ally who has been attacked.
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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.
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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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To succeed in the world we must look foolish but be wise.
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Nature is just to all mankind, and repays them for their industry. She renders them industrious by annexing rewards in proportion to their labor.
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There are countries where a man is worth nothing; there are others where he is worth less than nothing.
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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.
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There are bad examples which are worse than crimes; and more states have perished from the violation of morality than from the violation of law.
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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.
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Certain kinds of foolishness are such that a greater foolishness would be better.
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Not to be loved is a misfortune, but it is an insult to be loved no longer.
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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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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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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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I suffer from the disease of writing books and being ashamed of them when they are finished.
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Love of reading enables a man to exchange the weary hours, which come to every one, for hours of delight.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU