“People praise virtue, but they hate it, they run away from it.”

—  Denis Diderot, book Rameau's Nephew

Rameau's Nephew (1762)
Context: 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.

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "People praise virtue, but they hate it, they run away from it." by Denis Diderot?
Denis Diderot photo
Denis Diderot106
French Enlightenment philosopher and encyclopædist 1713–1784

Related quotes

“From praise comes joy, from joy – strength, from strength – virtue, from virtue – purity and from purity comes realization of one’s full potential.”

Leon MacLaren (1910–1994) British philosopher

Leon MacLaren, The Machinery of Government, 1998

Terry Pratchett photo

“The trouble with witches is that they’ll never run away from things they really hate.

And the trouble with small furry animals in a corner is that, just occasionally, one of them’s a mongoose.”

Terry Pratchett book Witches Abroad

Source: Witches Abroad

Quintilian photo

“We give to necessity the praise of virtue.”
Laudem virtutis necessitati damus.

Quintilian (35–96) ancient Roman rhetor

Book I, Chapter VIII, 14
Compare: "To maken vertue of necessite", Geoffrey Chaucer, Canterbury Tales, "The Knightes Tale", line 3044
De Institutione Oratoria (c. 95 AD)

Joseph Heller photo

“I’m not running away from my responsibilities. I’m running to them. There’s nothing negative about running away to save my life.”

Joseph Heller book Catch-22

Source: Catch-22

“I believe that too many people stay at jobs they hate to get more vacation days so that they can spend more time away from the jobs they hate.”

Jim Warda

Sinclair Lewis photo

“It came to him merely to run away was folly, because he could never run away from himself.”

Sinclair Lewis book Babbitt

Babbitt (1922), Ch. 25

John Milton photo

“I cannot praise a fugitive and cloistered virtue, unexercised and unbreathed, that never sallies out and sees her adversary, but slinks out of the race where that immortal garland is to be run for, not without dust and heat.”

John Milton book Areopagitica

Source: Areopagitica

“After all this running away from finished things, I ran into myself as a finished thing. And I’m still running away from finished things.”

Antonio Porchia (1885–1968) Italian Argentinian poet

Después de tanto huir de las cosas hechas, me he encontrado yo mismo una cosa hecha. Y sigo huyendo de las cosas hechas.
Voces (1943)

Ben Harper photo

“You can run away from home
But you can't run away from your pain
I sit here alone
There's always someone else to blame.”

Ben Harper (1969) singer-songwriter and musician

Up to You Now.
Song lyrics, White Lies for Dark Times (2009)

Related topics