The arbitrary rule of a just and enlightened prince is always bad. His virtues are the most dangerous and the surest form of seduction: they lull a people imperceptibly into the habit of loving, respecting, and serving his successor, whoever that successor may be, no matter how wicked or stupid.
Denis Diderot
Virtue is praised, but hated. People run from it, for it is ice-cold and in this world you have to keep your feet warm.
Denis Diderot
The philosopher has never killed any priests, whereas the priest has killed a great many philosophers.
Denis Diderot
Man will never be free until the last king is strangled with the entrails of the last priest
Denis Diderot
The decisions of law courts should never be printed: in the long run, they form a counter authority to the law.
Denis Diderot
Gaiety is a quality of ordinary men. Genius always presupposes some disorder in the machine.
Denis Diderot
We are all instruments endowed with feeling and memory. Our senses are so many strings that are struck by surrounding objects and that also frequently strike themselves.
Denis Diderot
The pit of a theatre is the one place where the tears of virtuous and wicked men alike are mingled.
Denis Diderot
Patriotism is an ephemeral motive that scarcely ever outlasts the particular threat to society that aroused it.
Denis Diderot