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It is too difficult to think nobly when one thinks only of earning a living.

Jean-Jacques Rousseau

The real world has its limits; the imaginary world is infinite. Unable to enlarge the one, let us restrict the other, for it is from the difference between the two alone that are born all the pains which make us truly unhappy.
JEAN-JACQUES ROUSSEAU

Alone Born Difference Happiness Limitation Oneself Pain Reality World
Happiness requires three things, a good bank account, a good cook, and good digestion.
JEAN-JACQUES ROUSSEAU

Food Goodness Happiness Money
In respect of riches, no citizen shall ever be wealthy enough to buy another, and none poor enough to be forced to sell himself.
JEAN-JACQUES ROUSSEAU

Citizen Enough Force Humanity Respect Rich Worth
I feel an indescribable ecstasy and delirium in melting, as it were, into the system of being, in identifying myself with the whole of nature.
JEAN-JACQUES ROUSSEAU

Feeling Identify Myself Nature
Everything is good as it comes from the hands of the Maker of the world, but degenerates once it gets into the hands of man
JEAN-JACQUES ROUSSEAU

Destroy Goodness Hands Man World
I have never thought, for my part, that man’s freedom consists in his being able to do whatever he wills, but that he should not, by any human power, be forced to do what is against his will.
JEAN-JACQUES ROUSSEAU

Force Freedom Himself Human Man Myself Power Thinking Willing
Being wealthy isn’t just a question of having lots of money. It’s a question of what we want. Wealth isn’t an absolute, it’s relative to desire. Every time we seek something that we can’t afford, we can be counted as poor, how much money we may actually have.
JEAN-JACQUES ROUSSEAU

Desire Money Philosophy Rich Seek Time
I prefer liberty with danger than peace with slavery.
JEAN-JACQUES ROUSSEAU

Danger Liberty Myself Peace Slave
If we assume man has been corrupted by an artificial civilization, what is the natural state? the state of nature from which he has been removed? imagine, wandering up and down the forest without industry, without speech, and without home.
JEAN-JACQUES ROUSSEAU

Civilization Deep Home Imagination Man Nature Philosophy
Nature made me happy and good, and if I am otherwise, it is society’s fault.
JEAN-JACQUES ROUSSEAU

Happiness Nature People
I perceive God everywhere in His works. I sense Him in me; I see Him all around me.
JEAN-JACQUES ROUSSEAU

God Himself Myself Religious Spiritual
However great a man’s natural talent may be, the act of writing cannot be learned all at once.
JEAN-JACQUES ROUSSEAU

Act Greatness Learning Man Talent Writing
To do is to be.
JEAN-JACQUES ROUSSEAU

Action One Liner
If there were a nation of Gods, it would govern itself democratically. A government so perfect is not suited to men.
JEAN-JACQUES ROUSSEAU

Democracy God Government Nation Perfection
In any real democracy, magistracy isn’t a benefit—it’s a burdensome responsibility that can’t fairly be imposed on one individual rather than another.
JEAN-JACQUES ROUSSEAU

Democracy Reality Responsibility
Man is born free, and everywhere he is in chains.
JEAN-JACQUES ROUSSEAU

Born Freedom Man Philosophy