Useless laws weaken the necessary laws.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEUThey who assert that a blind fatality produced the various effects we behold in this world talk very absurdly; for can anything be more unreasonable than to pretend that a blind fatality could be productive of intelligent beings.
More Baron de Montesquieu Quotes
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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 -
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 -
Honor is unknown in despotic states.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
If the triangles made a god, they would give him three sides.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
The public business must be carried on with a certain motion, neither too quick nor too slow.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
Republics come to an end by luxurious habits; monarchies by poverty.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
I have read descriptions of Paradise that would make any sensible person stop wanting to go there.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
Virtue in a republic is the love of one’s country, that is the love of equality.
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.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
Europe is a state with several provinces
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
In the matter of dress one should always keep below one’s ability.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
That anyone who possesses power has a tendency to abuse it is an eternal truth. They tend to go as far as the barriers will allow.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
If I knew of something that could serve my nation but would ruin another, I would not propose it to my prince, for I am first a man and only then a Frenchman… because I am necessarily a man, and only accidentally am I French.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
Virtue is necessary to a republic.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU -
It is unreasonable … to oblige a man not to attempt the defense of his own life.
BARON DE MONTESQUIEU