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The first man, who, after enclosing a piece of ground, took it into his head to say, This is mine, and found people simple enough to believe him, was the true founder of civil society.

Jean-Jacques Rousseau

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 Man Nation
The first man who, having enclosed a piece of ground, bethought himself of saying ‘this is mine’, and found people simple enough to believe him, was the real founder of civil society.
JEAN-JACQUES ROUSSEAU

Believe Enough Greatness Himself People Pieces Reality Simplicity
If there is in this world a well-attested account, it is that of vampires. Nothing is lacking: official reports, affidavits of well-known people, of surgeons, of priests, of magistrates; the judicial proof is most complete. And with all that, who is there who believes in vampires?
JEAN-JACQUES ROUSSEAU

Believe Fantasy People Reality World
But in some great souls, who consider themselves as citizens of the world, and forcing the imaginary barriers that separate people from people.
JEAN-JACQUES ROUSSEAU

Citizen Force Greatness Imagination People Philosophy Soul World
I prefer liberty with danger than peace with slavery.
JEAN-JACQUES ROUSSEAU

Danger Liberty Myself Peace Slave
Girls should learn that so much finery is only put on to hide defects, and that the triumph of beauty is to shine by itself.
JEAN-JACQUES ROUSSEAU

Beautiful Hide Learning Make Up Self Love Shine Woman
One does not drink. One gives a kiss to his glass, and the wine returns a caress to you.
JEAN-JACQUES ROUSSEAU

Drink Kiss Oneself Wine Yourself
My love for imaginary objects and my facility in lending myself to them ended by disillusioning me with everything around me, and determined that love of solitude which I have retained ever since that time.
JEAN-JACQUES ROUSSEAU

Imagination Love Myself Solitude Time
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
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
Every artists wants to be applauded
JEAN-JACQUES ROUSSEAU

Art Praise
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 Happiness Identify Myself Nature
In truth, laws are always useful to those with possessions and harmful to those who have nothing; from which it follows that the social state is advantageous to men only when all possess something and none has too much.
JEAN-JACQUES ROUSSEAU

Law Man Material Truth
The social pact, far from destroying natural equality, substitutes, on the contrary, a moral and lawful equality for whatever physical inequality that nature may have imposed on mankind; so that however unequal in strength and intelligence, men become equal by covenant and by right.
JEAN-JACQUES ROUSSEAU

Destroy Equality Intelligence Law Man Nature Strength
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
To renounce liberty is to renounce being a man, to surrender the rights of humanity and even its duties.
JEAN-JACQUES ROUSSEAU

Humanity Liberty Man Right