Voltaire

How pleasant it is for a father to sit at his child’s board. It is like an aged man reclining under the shadow of an oak which he has planted.

It is forbidden to kill; therefore all murderers are punished unless they kill in large numbers and to the sound of trumpets.

There are truths which are not for all men, nor for all times.

It is lamentable, that to be a good patriot one must become the enemy of the rest of mankind.

The ancients recommended us to sacrifice to the Graces, but Milton sacrificed to the Devil.

Our country is that spot to which our heart is bound.

We learned about dignity and decency – that how hard you work matters more than how much you make… that helping others means more than just getting ahead yourself.

When any calamity has been suffered the first thing to be remembered is, how much has been escaped.

I find that the Americans have no passions, they have appetites.

Society never advances. It recedes as fast on one side as it gains on the other. Society acquires new arts, and loses old instincts.

Sow a thought and you reap an action; sow an act and you reap a habit; sow a habit and you reap a character; sow a character and you reap a destiny.

Our chief want in life is somebody who shall make us do what we can.

The worst solitude is to have no real friendships.

The test of a man or woman’s breeding is how they behave in a quarrel.

I constantly ask myself if what I’m doing is for me or somebody else. It’s tripping me out!

He may justly be numbered among the benefactors of mankind, who contracts the great rules of life into short sentences, that may early be impressed on the memory, and taught by frequent recollection to occur habitually to the mind.

It is admirable to consider how many Millions of People come into, and go out of the World, Ignorant of themselves, and of the World they have lived in.

Resolve not to be poor: whatever you have, spend less. Poverty is a great enemy to human happiness; it certainly destroys liberty, and it makes some virtues impracticable, and others extremely difficult.

Wisdom has its root in goodness, not goodness its root in wisdom.

Words mean more than what is set down on paper. It takes the human voice to infuse them with deeper meaning.

Such is the state of life, that none are happy but by the anticipation of change: the change itself is nothing; when we have made it, the next wish is to change again.