“He who would teach men to die would teach them to live.”
Book I, Ch. 20
Essais (1595), Book I
Variant: He who should teach men to die would at the same time teach them to live.
Letter to his son, published in The Life and Letters of Right Honorable Friedrich Max Müller (1902) edited by Georgina Müller, Vol. II, Ch. XXXII
Reply to a Roman Catholic student urging him to pray to Jesus Christ, the Virgin Mary, and convert to Christianity.
Source: Attributed in posthumous publications, Einstein's God (1997), p. 88
Source: Why We Fail as Christians (1919), p. 53
Context: There is a world of difference between the one who would imitate the conduct of the successful merchant, who sits in the front pew of his church, and him who would follow literally the teachings of Jesus Christ. To attain perfectly the one ideal—if it be an ideal—is a comparatively simple task. To attain the other, is perhaps an impossibility.
About Hollywood. As quoted in the New York Times article Terry Gilliam's Feel-Good Endings http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/14/movies/14mcgr.html?_r=1&pagewanted=1&ref=terrygilliam (14 August 2005)
