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A true philosopher is like an elephant; he never puts the second foot down until the first one is solidly in place.

Bernard le Bovier de Fontenelle

Our sun enlightens the planets that belong to him; why may not every fixed star also have planets to which they give light?
BERNARD LE BOVIER DE FONTENELLE

Enlighted Future Light Stars
It takes time to ruin a world, but time is all it takes.
BERNARD LE BOVIER DE FONTENELLE

Libertarian Liberty World
An educated mind is, as it were, composed of all the minds of preceding ages.
BERNARD LE BOVIER DE FONTENELLE

Age Educated Mind
To despise theory is to have the excessively vain pretension to do without knowing what one does, and to speak without knowing what one says.
BERNARD LE BOVIER DE FONTENELLE

Knowing Pretension Speak
They will have the World to be in Large, what a Watch is in Small; which is very regular, and depends only upon the just disposing of the several Parts of the Movement.
BERNARD LE BOVIER DE FONTENELLE

Life Science Watches
A work of morality, politics, criticism will be more elegant, other things being equal, if it is shaped by the hand of geometry.
BERNARD LE BOVIER DE FONTENELLE

Geometry Hands Math Work
Leibniz never married; he had considered it at the age of fifty; but the person he had in mind asked for time to reflect. This gave Leibniz time to reflect, too, and so he never married.
BERNARD LE BOVIER DE FONTENELLE

Math Mind Reflect Time
I hate war, for it spoils conversation.
BERNARD LE BOVIER DE FONTENELLE

Conversation Hate War
Modesty in women has two special advantages,–it enhances beauty and veils uncomeliness.
BERNARD LE BOVIER DE FONTENELLE

Special Two Veils
A well-cultivated mind is, so to speak, made up of all the minds of preceding ages; it is only one single mind which has been educated during all this time.
BERNARD LE BOVIER DE FONTENELLE

Inspirational Mind Motivation
I have lived one hundred years; and I die with the consolation of never having thrown the slightest ridicule upon the smallest virtue.
BERNARD LE BOVIER DE FONTENELLE

Hundred Virtue Years
Behold a universe so immense that I am lost in it. I no longer know where I am. I am just nothing at all. Our world is terrifying in its insignificance.
BERNARD LE BOVIER DE FONTENELLE

Knowledge Nothing Science World
A philosopher will not believe what he sees because he is too busy speculating about what he does not see.
BERNARD LE BOVIER DE FONTENELLE

Believe Busy Philosopher
People almost always do great things without knowing how to do them, and are quite surprised to have done them.
BERNARD LE BOVIER DE FONTENELLE

Done Knowing People
Nature intends that, at fixed periods, men should succeed each other by the instrumentality of death. We shall never outwit Nature; we shall die as usual.
BERNARD LE BOVIER DE FONTENELLE

Death Men Succeed Usual
The judgment may be compared to a clock or watch, where the most ordinary machine is sufficient to tell the hours; but the most elaborate alone can point out the minutes and seconds, and distinguish the smallest differences of time.
BERNARD LE BOVIER DE FONTENELLE

Differences Ordinary Watches