Denis Diderot: Trending quotes (page 5)

Denis Diderot trending quotes. Read the latest quotes in collection
Denis Diderot: 212   quotes 19   likes

“The first promise exchanged by two beings of flesh was at the foot of a rock that was crumbling into dust; they took as witness for their constancy a sky that is not the same for a single instant; everything changed in them and around them, and they believed their hearts free of vicissitudes. O children! always children!”

Denis Diderot

p, 125
Jacques le Fataliste (1796)

Children , Change , Heart

“Gratitude is a burden, and every burden is made to be shaken off.”

Denis Diderot book Rameau's Nephew

La reconnaissance est un fardeau, et tout fardeau est fait pour être secoué.
Rameau's Nephew (1762)

Gratitude

“Jacques said that his master said that everything good or evil we encounter here below was written on high.”

Denis Diderot

Prologue
Jacques le Fataliste (1796)

Evil

“The infant runs toward it with its eyes closed, the adult is stationary, the old man approaches it with his back turned.”

Denis Diderot

"Death"
Elements of Physiology (1875)

“Morals are in all countries the result of legislation and government; they are not African or Asian or European: they are good or bad.”

Denis Diderot

Observations on the Drawing Up of Laws (1774)

Country

“Distance is a great promoter of admiration!”

Denis Diderot

As quoted in Thesaurus of Epigrams: A New Classified Collection of Witty Remarks, Bon Mots and Toasts (1942) by Edmund Fuller

“Impenetrable in their dissimulation, cruel in their vengeance, tenacious in their purposes, unscrupulous as to their methods, animated by profound and hidden hatred for the tyranny of man — it is as though there exists among them an ever-present conspiracy toward domination, a sort of alliance like that subsisting among the priests of every country.”

Denis Diderot

"On Women" (1772), as translated in Selected Writings (1966) edited by Lester G. Crocker

Animals , Country

“One may demand of me that I should seek truth, but not that I should find it.”

Denis Diderot

On doit exiger de moi que je cherche la vérité, mais non que je la trouve.
No. 29; Variant translation: I can be expected to look for truth but not to find it.
Pensées Philosophiques (1746)

Truth

“The world is the house of the strong. I shall not know until the end what I have lost or won in this place, in this vast gambling den where I have spent more than sixty years, dicebox in hand, shaking the dice.”

Denis Diderot

Conclusion
Elements of Physiology (1875)

World , Strong , Housing

“Only a very bad theologian would confuse the certainty that follows revelation with the truths that are revealed. They are entirely different things.”

Denis Diderot

Apology for the Abbé de Prades (1752)

Truth

“Are we not madder than those first inhabitants of the plain of Sennar? We know that the distance separating the earth from the sky is infinite, and yet we do not stop building our tower.”

Denis Diderot

No. 4
On the Interpretation of Nature (1753)

“The wisest among us is very lucky never to have met the woman, be she beautiful or ugly, intelligent or stupid, who could drive him crazy enough to be fit to be put into an asylum.”

Denis Diderot

Ceci n’est pas un conte [This Is No Tale] (1796),

Stupidity , Beauty , Intelligence

“To say that man is a compound of strength and weakness, light and darkness, smallness and greatness, is not to indict him, it is to define him.”

Denis Diderot

As quoted in The Anchor Book of French Quotations with English Translations (1963) by Norbert Gutermam
Pensées Philosophiques (1746)

Light

“It has been said that love robs those who have it of their wit, and gives it to those who have none.”

Denis Diderot

Paradoxe sur le Comédien (1773-1777)

Love

“Disturbances in society are never more fearful than when those who are stirring up the trouble can use the pretext of religion to mask their true designs.”

Denis Diderot

Observations on the Drawing Up of Laws (1774)

Fear , Religion

“Bad company is as instructive as licentiousness. One makes up for the loss of one’s innocence with the loss of one’s prejudices.”

Denis Diderot book Rameau's Nephew

Rameau's Nephew (1762)

Loss

“I believe in God, although I live very happily with atheists… It is very important not to mistake hemlock for parsley; but not at all so to believe or not in God.”

Denis Diderot

As quoted in Against the Faith (1985) by Jim Herrick, p. 75
Variant translation: It is very important not to mistake hemlock for parsley, but to believe or not believe in God is not important at all.

God

“Justice is the first virtue of those who command, and stops the complaints of those who obey.”

Denis Diderot

As quoted in The Golden Treasury of Thought : A Gathering of Quotations from the Best Ancient and Modern Authors (1873) by Theodore Taylor, p. 227

Justice

“When one compares the talents one has with those of a Leibniz, one is tempted to throw away one's books and go die quietly in the dark of some forgotten corner.”

Denis Diderot

Oeuvres complètes, vol. 7, p. 678

Books

“Patriotism is an ephemeral motive that scarcely ever outlasts the particular threat to society that aroused it.”

Denis Diderot

Observations on the Drawing Up of Laws (1774)

Motivation