“Where am I, or what? From what causes do I derive my existence, and to what condition shall I return?”

What a peculiar privilege has this little agitation of the brain which we call ‘thought’

It is an absurdity to believe that the Deity has human passions, and one of the lowest of human passions, a restless appetite for applause

Tis not unreasonable for me to prefer the destruction of the whole world to the scratching of my finger.

The bigotry of theologians is a malady which seems almost incurable.

I weigh the one miracle against the other and according to the superiority which I discover, I pronounce my decision.

The science of man is the only solid foundation for the other sciences.

Carelessness and in-attention alone can afford us any remedy. For this reason I rely entirely upon them.

But the greatest part of mankind float between vice and virtue.

I never knew anyone, that examined and deliberated about nonsense, who did not believe it before the end of his enquiries.

Reason is, and ought only to be the slave of the passions, and can never pretend to any other office than to serve and obey them.

It is difficult for a man to speak long of himself without vanity.

Nothing is more usual than for philosophers to encroach upon the province of grammarians; and to engage in disputes of words, while they imagine that they are handling controversies of the deepest importance and concern

The gazing populace receive greedily, without examination, whatever soothes superstition and promotes wonder.

In public affairs men are often better pleased that the truth, though known to everybody, should be wrapped up under a decent cover than if it were exposed in open daylight to the eyes of all the world.

Beauty is no quality in things themselves: It exists merely in the mind which contemplates them; and each mind perceives a different beauty.

Reading and sauntering and lounging and dosing, which I call thinking, is my supreme Happiness.

It is not freedom from conditions, but it is freedom to take a stand toward the conditions.

Now I’ve been free, I know what a dreadful condition slavery is. I have seen hundreds of escaped slaves, but I never saw one who was willing to go back and be a slave.

People reveal themselves completely only when they are thrown out of the customary conditions of their life.

Authentic happiness is always independent of external conditions.

Public self is a conditioned construct of the inner psychological self.

It is not the consciousness of men that determines their being, but, on the contrary, their social being that determines their consciousness.

When there is freedom from mechanical conditioning, there is simplicity.

You can make some inferences about a man’s character if you know something about the conditions in which he has survived and prospered.