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The sublimity of administration consists in knowing the proper degree of power that should be exerted on different occasions.

Baron de Montesquieu

We ought to be very cautious and circumspect in the prosecution of magic and heresy. The attempt to put down these two crimes may be extremely perilous to liberty.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU

Magic Two Wisdom
In the infancy of societies, the chiefs of state shape its institutions; later the institutions shape the chiefs of state.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU

Institutions Shapes States
Study has been for me the sovereign remedy against all the disappointments of life. I have never known any trouble that an hour’s reading would not dissipate.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU

Disappointment Reading Sovereign
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

Education School Two
Do you think that God will punish them for not practicing a religion which he did not reveal to them?
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU

God Religion Thinking
I have never known any distress that an hour’s reading did not relieve.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU

Fearless Philosophical Reading
Useless laws weaken the necessary laws.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU

Law Liberty Philosophical
The public business must be carried on with a certain motion, neither too quick nor too slow.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU

Business Certain Motion Quick Slow
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

Law Passion Powerful
Politics are a smooth file, which cuts gradually, and attains its end by slow progression.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU

Cutting Politics Progression Smooth
There is still another inconvenieney in conquests made by democracies; their government is ever odious to the conquered states. It is apparently monarchical, but in reality it is more oppressive than monarchy, as the experience of all ages and countries evinces.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU

Country Government Reality
Very good laws may be ill timed.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU

Good Law May Very
I should like to abolish funerals; the time to mourn a person is at his birth, not his death.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU

Art History Philosophy
The spirit of moderation should also be the spirit of the lawgiver.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU

Law Philosophical Spirit
Virtue in a republic is the love of one’s country, that is the love of equality.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU

Country Republic Virtue
Wonderful maxim: not to talk of things any more after they are done.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU

Acceptance Done Wonderful

The sublimity of administration consists in knowing the proper degree of power that should be exerted on different occasions.

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The sublimity of administration consists in knowing the proper degree of power that should be exerted on different occasions.

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