Voltaire
Enlightenment philosopher
Sayings by Voltaire
We are born without knowledge, we acquire it by degrees.
Men are equal; it is not birth but virtue that makes the difference.
The only way to comprehend what humanity is, is to study what it has done.
The world is a stage, and the play is badly written.
It is the triumph of reason to get rid of the prejudices that one has acquired before knowing how to reason.
The more we know, the more we are aware of our ignorance.
The Holy Roman Empire is neither holy, nor Roman, nor an empire.
The best government is a benevolent tyranny tempered by epigrams.
All styles are good except the tiresome kind.
History is nothing but a pack of tricks that we play upon the dead.
The instruction we have received, the example we have seen, the books we have read, the conversations we have had, all these make us what we are.
Judge a man by his questions rather than by his answers.
Work keeps at bay three great evils: boredom, vice, and need.
The most important decision you make is to be in a good mood.
To succeed in the world, it is not enough to be stupid, you must also be well-mannered.
It is an established fact that luxury nourishes a thousand families in London and ruins a hundred thousand in the Indies.
Every man is guilty of all the good he did not do.
The multitude of books is a great evil.
Chance is a word void of sense; nothing can exist without a cause.
When it is a question of money, everybody is of the same religion.