Voltaire

The ideal form of government is democracy tempered with assassination.

It is not enough to conquer; one must learn to seduce.

Injustice in the end produces independence.

Clever tyrants are never punished.

Business is the salt of life.

He who has not the spirit of this age, has all the misery of it.

Life is a journey. Time is a river. The door is ajar.

God enters by a private door into every individual.

Some thoughts always find us young, and keep us so. Such a thought is the love of the universal and eternal beauty.

Listening to both sides does not necessarily bring about a correct judgment.

Friendship increases in visiting friends, but in visiting them seldom.

Politics is the gizzard of society, full of gut and gravel.

No soul is desolate as long as there is a human being for whom it can feel trust and reverence.

As long as a man stands in his own way, everything seems to be in his way.

The heart is forever inexperienced.

To laugh often and much; to win the respect of intelligent people and the affection of children; to earn the appreciation of honest critics and endure the betrayal of false friends; to appreciate beauty; to find the best in others; to leave the world a bit better, whether by a healthy child, a garden patch or a redeemed social condition; to know even one life has breathed easier because you have lived. This is to have succeeded.

We are much beholden to Machiavel and others, that write what men do, and not what they ought to do.

The trade of advertising is now so near perfection that it is not easy to propose any improvement. But as every art ought to be exercised in due subordination to the public good, I cannot but propose it as a moral question to these masters of the public ear, whether they do not sometimes play too wantonly with our passions.

It ain’t what you don’t know that gets you into trouble. It’s what you know for sure that just ain’t so.

A woman is a woman, but a good cigar is a smoke.

Life cannot subsist in society but by reciprocal concessions.