Who Is Voltaire Quotes & Sayings

In this country [England] it is good to kill an admiral from time to time, to encourage the others. The reference is to Admiral John Byng, who was executed in 1757 for failing to prevent the French from taking Minorca. — Voltaire

A fool is a person who guesses and gets it wrong, a clever man is one who guesses, regardless of time period, and gets it right. — Voltaire

He who is involved in ecstasies and visions, who takes dreams for reality, and his own imagination for prophesy, is a fanatical novice of great hope and promise, and will soon advance to the higher stage and kill men for the love of God. — Voltaire

Virtue between men is a commerce of good actions: he who has no part in this commerce must not be reckoned. — Voltaire

At a great distance appeared with the same pomp the sheep of Thebes, the dog of Bubastis, the cat of Phoebe, the crocodile of Arsinoe, the goat of Mendes, and all the inferior gods of Egypt, who came to pay homage to the great ox, to the mighty Apis, as powerful as Isis, Osiris, and Horus, united together.
In the midst of the demi-gods, forty priests carried an enormous basket, filled with sacred onions. These were, it is true, gods, but they resembled onions very much.
("The White Bull") — Voltaire

It is evident that most of what we think of as our medieval ancestors' barbaric practices were based on mistaken beliefs about how the laws of nature actually operate. If you - and everyone around you, including ecclesiastical and political authorities - truly believe that witches cause disease, crop failures, sickness, catastrophes, and accidents, then it is not only a rational act to burn witches, it is also a moral duty. This is what Voltaire meant when he wrote that people who believe absurdities are more likely to commit atrocities. — Michael Shermer

It is demonstrable," said he, "that things cannot be otherwise than as they are; for as all things have been created for some end, they must necessarily be created for the best end. Observe, for instance, the nose is formed for spectacles, therefore we wear spectacles. The legs are visibly designed for stockings, accordingly we wear stockings. Stones were made to be hewn and to construct castles, therefore My Lord has a magnificent castle; for the greatest baron in the province ought to be the best lodged. Swine were intended to be eaten, therefore we eat pork all the year round: and they, who assert that everything is right, do not express themselves correctly; they should say that everything is best. — Voltaire

One of the towering figures of the age of Enlightenment was Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, known to this day in German-speaking lands as the poet of princes and prince of poets. Unlike Voltaire, he openly practiced esoteric disciplines, particularly alchemy. He wrote a famous verse about the Cathars, which translated says: "There were those who knew the Father. What became of them? Oh, they took them and burned them!" Goethe's chief work, of course, is his Faust. As noted in chapter 8, the figure of Faust was inspired by the image of the early Gnostic teacher Simon Magus, one of whose honorific names was Faustus. While in Christopher Marlowe's sixteenth-century play, — Stephan A. Hoeller

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. — Voltaire

He who has heard the same thing told by 12,000 eye-witnesses has only 12,000 probabilities, which are equal to one strong probability, which is far from certain. — Voltaire

there is no such thing as chance. All is either a trial, or a punishment, or a reward, or a foresight. Remember the fisherman, who thought himself the most wretched of mankind. Oromazes sent thee to change his fate. Cease then, frail mortal, to dispute against what thou oughtest to adore." "But, — Voltaire

Voltaire said you know who is in control by what you can't say. — Kris Saknussemm

Of those who have commanded battalions and squadrons, only the names remain. The human race has nothing to show for a hundred battles that have been waged. But the great men I speak to you about have prepared pure and lasting pleasures for men yet to be born. A canal lock uniting two seas, a painting by Poussin, a beautiful tragedy, a newly discovered truth-these are things a thousand times more precious than all the annals of the court or all the accounts of military campaigns. You know that, with me, great men come first and heroes last.

I call great men all those who have excelled in creating what is useful or agreeable. The plunderers of the provinces are merely heroes. — Voltaire

The sovereign is called a tyrant who knows no laws but his caprice. — Voltaire

Everything happens through immutable laws, ... everything is necessary ... There are, some persons say, some events which are necessary and others which are not. It would be very comic that one part of the world was arranged, and the other were not; that one part of what happens had to happen and that another part of what happens did not have to happen. If one looks closely at it, one sees that the doctrine contrary to that of destiny is absurd; but there are many people destined to reason badly; others not to reason at all others to persecute those who reason. — Voltaire

Our character is composed of our ideas and our feelings: and, since it has been proved that we give ourselves neither feelings nor ideas, our character does not depend on us. If it did depend on us, there is nobody who would not be perfect. If one does not reflect, one thinks oneself master of everything; but when one does reflect, one realizes that one is master of nothing — Voltaire

He who thinks himself wise, O heavens! is a great fool. — Voltaire

The take-home message is that we should blame religion itself, not religious extremism - as though that were some kind of terrible perversion of real, decent religion. Voltaire got it right long ago: 'Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities.' So did Bertrand Russell: 'Many people would sooner die than think. In fact they do. — Richard Dawkins

The husband who decides to surprise his wife is often very much surprised himself. — Voltaire

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. — Voltaire

It is the triumph of superior reason to live with folks who don't have any. — Voltaire

I advise you to go on living solely to enrage those who are paying your annuities. It is the only pleasure I have left. — Voltaire

Our wretched species is so made that those who walk on the well-trodden path always throw stones at those who are showing a new road. — Voltaire

Observe that noses were made to wear spectacles; and so we have spectacles. Legs were visibly instituted to be breeched, and we have breeches. Stones were formed to be quarried and to build castles; and My Lord has a very noble castle; the greatest Baron in the province should have the best house; and as pigs were made to be eaten, we eat pork all year round; consequently, those who have asserted all is well talk nonsense; they ought to have said that all is for the best. — Voltaire

Those who are absent, by its means become present: correspondence is the consolation of life. - VOLTAIRE, Philosophical Dictionary — Colin Dexter

The Dutch fetishes who converted me tell me every Sunday that the blacks and whites are all children of one father, whom they call Adam. As for me, I do not understand anything of genealogies; but if what these preachers say is true, we are all second cousins; and you must allow that it is impossible to be worse treated by our relations than we are. — Voltaire

Before receiving your instruction, I must tell you what happened to me one day. I had just had a closet built at the end of my garden. I heard a mole arguing with a cockchafer; 'Here's a fine structure,' said the mole, 'it must have been a very powerful mole who did this work.' 'You're joking,' said the cockchafer; 'it's a cockchafer full of genius who is the architect of this building.' From that moment I resolved never to argue. — Voltaire

There are some men who are counted great because they represent the actuality of their own age, and mirror it as it is. Such an one was Voltaire, of whom it was epigrammatically said: 'he expressed everybody's thoughts better than anyone.' But there are other men who attain greatness because they embody the potentiality of their own day and magically reflect the future. They express the thoughts which will be everybody's two or three centuries after them. Such as one was Descartes. — Thomas Henry Huxley

A clergyman is one who feels himself called upon to live without working at the expense of the rascals who work to live. — Voltaire

Miss, you are seventy-two percent noble and don't have a cent. Whether or not you marry the greatest lord in South America - who has an extraordinarily handsome mustache - is entirely up to you. — Voltaire

Anyone who seeks to destroy the passions instead of controlling them is trying to play the angel. — Voltaire

FANATICISM is, to superstition, what delirium is to fever, and fury to anger : he who has ecstasies and visions, who takes dreams for realities, and imaginations for prophecies, is an enthusiast ; and he, who sticks not at supporting his folly by murder, is a fanatic. — Voltaire

A physician is one who pours drugs of which he knows little into a body of which he knows less. — Voltaire

And ask each passenger to tell his story, and if there is one of them all who has not cursed his existence many times, and said to himself over and over again that he was the most miserable of men, I give you permission to throw me head-first into the sea. — Voltaire

So it is the human condition that to wish for the greatness of one's fatherland is to wish evil to one's neighbors. The citizen of the universe would be the man who wishes his country never to be either greater or smaller, richer or poorer. — Voltaire

He who is not just is severe, he who is not wise is sad. — Voltaire

The man visited by ecstasies and visions, who takes dreams for realities is an enthusiast; the man who supports his madness with murder is a fanatic. — Voltaire

Ideas are like beards. Men don't have them until they grow up. Somebody said that, but I can't remember who."
"Voltaire," the younger man said. He rubbed his chin and smiled, a cheerful,
unaffected smile. "Voltaire might be off the mark, though, when it comes to me. I have hardly any beard at all, but have loved thinking about things since I was a kid."
His face was indeed smooth, with no hint of a beard. His eyebrows were narrow, but thick, his ears nicely formed, like lovely seashells. "I wonder if what Voltaire meant wasn't ideas as much as meditation," Tsukuru said. The man inclined his head a fraction. "Pain is what gives rise to meditation. It has
nothing to do with age, let alone beards. — Haruki Murakami

One entry was entitled: "About God":
"This thought has been ascribed to Voltaire: If God did not exist, mankind would have invented Him. I find more truth in the reverse: If there really is a God, then we should seek to forget Him, to raise up men who will to do good for goodness' sake, not out of fear of punishment for their bad deeds. How can someone give alms to a poor man with a clean heart when he believes, and has an interest in believing, that there is a God who keeps score in heaven, who looks down and nods in approval? — Henrik Pontoppidan

It is clear that the individual who persecutes a man, his brother, because he is not of the same opinion, is a monster. — Voltaire

A physician is an unfortunate gentleman who is every day required to perform a miracle; namely to reconcile health with intemperance. — Voltaire

The man who leaves money to charity in his will is only giving away what no longer belongs to him — Voltaire

War is the greatest of all crimes; and yet there is no aggressor who does not color his crime with the pretext of justice. — Voltaire

Consequently they who assert that all is well have said a foolish thing, they should have said all is for the best. — Voltaire

God is not on the side of the big battalions, but on the side of those who shoot best. — Voltaire

If there are atheists, who is to be blamed if not the mercenary tyrants of souls who, in revolting us against their swindles, compel some feeble spirits to deny the God whom these monsters dishonour? — Voltaire

We offer up prayers to god only because we have made him after our own image. We treat him like a pasha, or a sultan, who is capable of being exasperated and appeased. — Voltaire

He shines in the second rank, who is eclipsed in the first. — Voltaire

What is called happiness is an abstract idea, composed of various ideas of pleasure; for he who has but a moment of pleasure is not a happy man, in like manner that a moment of grief constitutes not a miserable one. — Voltaire

What! my lord," cried the fisherman, "and art thou then so unhappy, thou who bestowest favors?" "A hundred times more unhappy than thee," replied Zadig. "But how is it possible," said the good man, "that the giver can be more wretched than the receiver?" "Because," replied Zadig, "thy greatest misery arose from poverty, and mine is seated in the heart." "Did — Voltaire

When he to whom one speaks does not understand, and he who speaks himself does not understand, that is metaphysics. — Voltaire

Yes, the laws of self-preservation and of self-destruction are equally powerful in this world. The devil will hold his empire over humanity until a limit of time which is still unknown. You laugh? You do not believe in the devil? Scepticism as to the devil is a French idea, and it is also a frivolous idea. Do you know who the devil is? Do you know his name? Although you don't know his name you make a mockery of his form, following the example of Voltaire. You sneer at his hoofs, at his tail, at his horns - all of them the produce of your imagination! In reality the devil is a great and terrible spirit, with neither hoofs, nor tail, nor horns; it is you who have endowed him with these attributes! But ... he is not the question just now! — Fyodor Dostoyevsky

And I think it was a great Frenchman, Voltaire, who said that the beginning of wisdom is the moment when one understands how little concerned with one's own life are other men, they who are so desperately preoccupied with their own. I knew nothing about you and that boy, nothing at all. — William Styron

But nothing is more estimable than a physician who, having studied nature from his youth, knows the properties of the human body, the diseases which assail it, the remedies which will benefit it, exercises his art with caution, and pays equal attention to the rich and the poor. — Voltaire

You see, Mademoiselle, I have experience, I know the world. To pass the time, why don't you ask every passenger to tell you his life's story? And if there is a single one among them who has never cursed his life, who has not often told himself that he was the unhappiest of men, then you may throw me overboard, headfirst! — Voltaire

Opinion rules the world, but in the long run it is the philosophers who shape opinion — Voltaire

Clearly," I said, "we should choose not to have good sense, if that good sense contributes to our misery."
Everyone agreed with me, and yet I found no one who wanted to accept the bargain of becoming ignorant in order to become content. From this I concluded that though we greatly value happiness, we place even greater value on reason.
But yet, upon reflection, it seems that to prefer reason to happiness is to be quite insane. — Voltaire

Men are in general so tricky, so envious, and so cruel that when we find one who is only weak, we are too happy. — Voltaire

Woe to the makers of literal translations, who by rendering every word weaken the meaning! It is indeed by so doing that we can say the letter kills and the spirit gives life. — Voltaire

He is the man who knows everything and never dies. — Voltaire

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

What then is human life? O virtue, how hast thou served me? Two women have basely deceived me; and now a third, who is innocent, and more beautiful than both the others, is going to be put to death! Whatever good I have done hath been to me a continual source of calamity and affliction; and I have only been raised to the height of grandeur, to be tumbled down the most horrid precipice of misfortune. Filled — Voltaire

The true triumph of reason is that it enables us to get along with those who do not possess it. — Voltaire

In the time of Luther, Spinoza, Galileo, or Voltaire people did not complain because they were "offended" or "insulted" by the ideas these men put forward.123 New ideas were suppressed, to be sure, and even more brutally than nowadays, but not because people said they felt "offended." The Inquisition was not "insulted" by the heretics, atheists, and secularists they brought to the stake. Where does this contemporary preoccupation with being "offended" and "insulted" come from? Why do people feel victimized if contradicted? What is the origin of those frequent calls for "respect" and "dialogue," as if there were people who advocated "disrespect" or would favor stopping the dialogue? — Paul Cliteur