Jean Meslier citations

Jean Meslier: 4 citations0 J'aime

“Ceux qui se mêlent de faire ce beau métier de prophétiser et contrefaire les confidents et les messagers des dieux, et qui nous viennent parler de leur part, ne sont que des impudents menteurs, des insensés, des visionnaires, des fanatiques, des méchants imposteurs, des moqueurs, ou de fins et rusés politiques, qui ne se servent du nom et de l'autorité de Dieu que pour mieux jouer leur personnage, en trompant ainsi les hommes.”

Jean Meslier

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“La religion est une vraie pépinière de fanatiques : c'est véritablement le théâtre où ils jouent le mieux leurs personnages”

Jean Meslier

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Jean Meslier: Citations en anglais

“How I suffered when I had to preach to you those pious lies that I detest in my heart. What remorse your credulity caused me! A thousand times I was on the point of breaking out publicly and opening your eyes, but a fear stronger than myself held me back, and forced me to keep silence until my death.”

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Jean Meslier

Quoted in Thinker: Jean Meslier by Colin Brewer, in rationalist.org (3 July 2007) http://rationalist.org.uk/articles/1425/thinker-jean-meslier <br class="br">Testament: Memoir of the Thoughts and Sentiments of Jean Meslier

“It is an act of cruelty, of barbarism, to kill, to strike unconscious, and to cut the throat of animals, who do no harm to anyone, the way we do; because they are sensitive to injury and pain just as we are, regardless of what is said vainly, falsely, and ridiculously by our new Cartesians, who regard them as purely machines without soul and without feelings … This is a ridiculous opinion, a pernicious principle, and a detestable doctrine, because it clearly tends to stifle in the hearts of men all feelings of kindness, of gentleness, and of humanity that they might have toward these poor animals. … Blessed are the nations that treat them kindly and favorably, who are compassionate toward their miseries and their pains; but cursed are the nations that treat them cruelly, who tyrannize over them, who enjoy shedding their blood, and who are avid to eat their flesh.”

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Jean Meslier

In Œuvres complètes (Paris: Anthropos, 1970–1972), t. I, 210-18; quoted in Matthieu Ricard, A Plea for the Animals, trans. Sherab Chödzin Kohn (Boulder, CO: Shambhala, 2016), p. 19 https://books.google.it/books?id=bTLuDAAAQBAJ&pg=PA19 <br class="br">Testament: Memoir of the Thoughts and Sentiments of Jean Meslier