Voltaire

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

If there were no God, it would be necessary to invent him.

Love is a canvas furnished by nature and embroidered by imagination.

Is there anyone so wise as to learn by the experience of others?

Nature has always had more force than education.

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

I didn’t find my friends; the good Lord gave them to me.

Condense some daily experience into a glowing symbol and an audience is electrified.

I heartily accept the motto,That government is best which governs least; and I should like to see it acted up to more rapidly and systematically. Carried out, it finally amounts to this, which I also believe,That government is best which governs not at all; and when men are prepared for it, that will be the kind of government which they will have. Government is at best but an expedient; but most governments are usually, and all governments are sometimes, inexpedient.

Wisdom begins in wonder.

No compliment can be eloquent, except as an expression of indifference.

Fatigue makes cowards of us all.

Only a man’s character is the real criterion of worth.

In conversation the game is, to say something new with old words. And you shall observe a man of the people picking his way along, step by step, using every time an old boulder, yet never setting his foot on an old place.

Haven’t you learned yet that I put something more than whisky into my speeches.

He that embarks on the voyage of life will always wish to advance rather by the impulse of the wind than the strokes of the oar; and many fold in their passage; while they lie waiting for the gale.

The fact that a believer is happier than a sceptic is no more to the point than the fact that a drunken man is happier than a sober one. The happiness of credulity is a cheap and dangerous quality.

People ignore the thing they have the most power over. I know so many people who will go to a protest and do something big on an issue. But they won’t deal with that issue in their home.

If I have said something to hurt a man once, I shall not get the better of this by saying many things to please him.

One of the lessons that I grew up with was to always stay true to yourself, and never let what somebody else says distract you from your goals.

A friend may well be reckoned the masterpiece of nature.