"People praise virtue, but they hate it, they run away from it. It freezes you to death, and in this world you've got to keep your feet warm."
Read quote
8 likes
Quote collection
Denis Diderot quotes (page 6 of 10)
187 quotes — follow a thought to its full quote page.
"There is no moral precept that does not have something inconvenient about it."
Read quote
7 likes
"We swallow with one gulp the lie that flatters us, and drink drop by drop the truth which is bitter to us."
Read quote
7 likes
"If exclusive privileges were not granted, and if the financial system would not tend to concentrate wealth, there would be few great fortunes and no quick wealth. When the means of growing rich is divided between a greater number of citizens, wealth will also be more evenly distributed; extreme poverty and extreme wealth would be also rare."
Read quote
7 likes
"The best doctor is the one you run to and can't find."
Read quote
7 likes
"The philosopher forms his principles on an infinity of particular observations. He does not confuse truth with plausibility, he takes for truth what is true, for false what is false, for doubtful what is doubtful, and probable what is probable. The philosophical spirit is thus a spirit of observation and accuracy."
Read quote
7 likes
"How old the world is! I walk between two eternities.... What is my fleeting existence in comparison with that decaying rock, that valley digging its channel ever deeper, that forest that is tottering and those great masses above my head about to fall? I see the marble of tombs crumbling into dust; and yet I don't want to die!"
Read quote
7 likes
"It is not the man who is beside himself, but he who is cool and collected,--who is master of his countenance, of his voice, of his actions, of his gestures, of every part of his play,--who can work upon others at his pleasure."
Read quote
7 likes
"If a misplaced admiration shows imbecility, an affected criticism shows vice of character. Expose thyself rather to appear a beast than false."
Read quote
7 likes
"It seems to me that if one had kept silence up to now regarding religion, people would still be submerged in the most grotesque and dangerous superstition ... regarding government, we would still be groaning under the bonds of feudal government ... regarding morals, we would still be having to learn what is virtue and what is vice. To forbid all these discussions, the only ones worthy of occupying a good mind, is to perpetuate the reign of ignorance and barbarism."
Read quote
7 likes
"The world is the house of the strong."
Read quote
7 likes
"Justice is the first virtue of those who command, and stops the complaints of those who obey."
Read quote
7 likes
"Gaiety is a quality of ordinary men. Genius always presupposes some disorder in the machine."
Read quote
7 likes
"There is not a Musselman alive who would not imagine that he was performing an action pleasing to God and his Holy Prophet by exterminating every Christian on earth, while the Christians are scarcely more tolerant on their side."
Read quote
7 likes
"The following general definition of an animal: a system of different organic molecules that have combined with one another, under the impulsion of a sensation similar to an obtuse and muffled sense of touch given to them by the creator of matter as a whole, until each one of them has found the most suitable position for its shape and comfort."
Read quote
7 likes
"A thing is not proved because no one has ever questioned it... Skepticism is the first step toward truth."
Read quote
7 likes
"The decisions of law courts should never be printed: in the long run, they form a counter authority to the law."
Read quote
6 likes
"There is only one duty; that is to be happy."
Read quote
6 likes
"I can be expected to look for truth but not to find it."
Read quote
6 likes
"Ignorance is less remote from the truth than prejudice."
Read quote
6 likes