Voltaire

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

The superfluous, a very necessary thing.

Optimism is the madness of insisting that all is well when we are miserable.

Superstition is to religion what astrology is to astronomy the mad daughter of a wise mother. These daughters have too long dominated the earth.

Let us read, and let us dance; these two amusements will never do any harm to the world.

The truths of religion are never so well understood as by those who have lost the power of reason.

It is a severe Rebuke upon us, that God makes us so many Allowances, and we make so few to our Neighbor: As if Charity had nothing to do with Religion; Or Love with Faith, that ought to work by it.

The superfluous, a very necessary thing.

It requires nothing less than a chivalric feeling to sustain a conversation with a lady.

All the reasonings of men are not worth one sentiment of women.

In America the geography is sublime, but the men are not; the inventions are excellent, but the inventors one is sometimes ashamed of.

A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little statesmen and philosophers and divines. With consistency a great soul has simply nothing to do. He may as well concern himself with his shadow on the wall. Speak what you think now in hard words, and to-morrow speak what to-morrow thinks in hard words again, though it contradict every thing you said to-day. — `Ah, so you shall be sure to be misunderstood.’ — Is it so bad, then, to be misunderstood? Pythagoras was misunderstood, and Socrates, and Jesus, and Luther, and Copernicus, and Galileo, and Newton, and every pure and wise spirit that ever took flesh. To be great is to be misunderstood.

Dancing is a perpendicular expression of a horizontal desire.

Patriotism is the last refuge of the scoundrel.

I believe that he was really sorry that people would not believe he was sorry that he was not more sorry.

A private Life is to be preferred; the Honor and Gain of publick Posts, bearing no proportion with the Comfort of it

The hour of departure has arrived and we go our ways; I to die, and you to live. Which is better? Only God knows.

I’m taking more time to listen to myself. It’s allowed me to be an aggressive bad ass, calling it as I see it

Despite the enormous quantity of books, how few people read! And if one reads profitably, one would realize how much stupid stuff the vulgar herd is content to swallow every day.

I decided that it was not wisdom that enabled poets to write their poetry, but a kind of instinct or inspiration, such as you find in seers and prophets who deliver all their sublime messages without knowing in the least what they mean.

The envious man grows lean at the success of his neighbor.