Voltaire Quotes

The more estimable the offender, the greater the torment.

The multiplicity of facts and writings is become so great that every thing must soon be reduced to extracts and dictionaries.

Often the prudent, far from making their destinies, succumb to them. -Francois

Give me a few minutes to talk away my face and I can seduce the Queen of France.

England has forty-two religions and only two sauces.

He is a hard man who is only just, and a sad one who is only wise.

He who can lead you to believe an absurdity can lead you to commit an atrocity.

I was never ruined but twice: once when I lost a lawsuit, and once when I won one.

The way to be a bore is to say everything.

The Pope is an idol whose hands are tied and whose feet are kissed.

One always speaks badly when one has nothing to say.

Let us meet four times a year in a grand temple with music, and thank God for all his gifts. There is one sun. There is one God. Let us have one religion. Then all mankind will be brethren.

Truth is a fruit that can only be picked when it is very ripe.

The first clergyman was the first rascal who met the first fool.

In this country we find it pays to shoot an admiral from time to time to encourage the others.

Theology is to religion what poisons are to food.

God created women only to tame men.

A witty quote proves nothing.

All is but illusion and disaster.

Man is not born wicked; he becomes so, as he becomes sick.

I have seen men incapable of the sciences, but never any incapable of virtue.

The right of commanding is no longer an advantage transmitted by nature; like an inheritance, it is the fruit of labors, the price of courage.

Feeble verses are those which sin not against rules, but against genius.

Heaven made virtue; man, the appearance.

Love truth, and pardon error.

Chess is a game which reflects most honor on human wit.

A historian has many duties... the first is not to slander; the second is not to bore

He was not the greatest of men but he was the greatest of kings.

Learn to cultivate your own garden.

I never approved either the errors of his book, or the trivial truths he so vigorously laid down. I have, however, stoutly taken his side when absurd men have condemned him for these same truths.

This is no time to be making new enemies.

What can I hope when all is right?

I swear that, not being able to be yours, I will belong to no one.

The only way to see the value of a play is to see it acted.

When he who hears does not know what he who speaks means, and when he who speaks does not know what he himself means, that is philosophy.

The way to become boring is to say everything.

had no need of a guide to learn ignorance

The superfluous is very necessary.

Men appear to prefer ruining one another's fortunes, and cutting each other's throats about a few paltry villages, to extending the grand means of human happiness.

There is only one morality, as there is only one geometry.

One feels like crawling on all fours after reading your work.

God is always on the side of the heaviest battalions.

The question of good and evil remains in irremediable chaos for those who seek to fathom it in reality. It is mere mental sport to the disputants, who are captives that play with their chains.

In every author let us distinguish the man from his works.

Changing a habit is hard work. But it's harder to find work that would be more fulfilling

Independence in the end is the fruit of injustice.

Happiness is not the portion of man.

Of all religions, Christianity is without a doubt the one that should inspire tolerance most

Love is a cloth which imagination embroiders.

Whenever an important event, a revolution, or a calamity turns to the profit of the church, such is always signalised as the Finger of God.