“The Christian religion is a stranger to mere despotic power. The mildness so frequently recommended in the Gospel is incompatible with the despotic rage.”

Political liberty in a citizen is that tranquillity of spirit which comes from the opinion each one has of his security, and in order for him to have this liberty the government must be such that one citizen cannot fear another citizen.

A fondness for reading changes the inevitable dull hours of our life into exquisite hours of delight.

The spirit of commerce… renders every man willing to live on his own property…& prevents the growth of luxury.

Society is the union of men and not the men themselves.

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.

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.

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.

Men should be bewailed at their birth, and not at their death.

An author is a fool who, not content with boring those he lives with, insists on boring future generations.

Europe is a state with several provinces

One more organ or one less in our body would give us a different intelligence. In fact, all the established laws as to why our body is a certain way would be different if our body were not that way.

As men are affected in all ages by the same passions, the occasions which bring about great changes are different, but the causes are always the same.

Each citizen contributes to the revenues of the State a portion of his property in order that his tenure of the rest may be secure.

A nation may lose its liberties in a day and not miss them in a century.

Liberty is the right to do what the law permits.

Love of reading enables a man to exchange the weary hours, which come to every one, for hours of delight.

There are two kinds of beauty; there is a beauty which God gives at birth, and which withers as a flower.

And when you allow nothing that lies hidden in the storehouse of your Christian religion to remain unused against the cancer that is destroying the vitality of our society in such alarming ways.

A charity which knows only how to give money is not yet Christian love. You will be free of guilt only when you also give your time, your energy, and your resourcefulness to help end such abuses for good,

There is no difference in the realization of the Truth either by a Muslim, Hindu, Zoroastrian, or a Christian. The difference is only in words and terms. Truth is not the monopoly of a particular race or religion.

Different people call on [God] by different names: some as Allah, some as God, and others as Krishna, Siva, and Brahman. It is like the water in a lake.

Women and Men, Christians and Jews, Muslims and Buddhists, white, black, red, brown.

An outrageous instinct to love and be loved blinded your arms to lines of propriety

A Christian home! What a power it is to the child when he is far away in the cold, tempting world, and voices of sin are filling his ears, and his feet stand on slippery places.