As soon as man enters into a state of society he loses the sense of his weakness; equality ceases, and then commences the state of war.

In the infancy of societies, the chiefs of state shape its institutions; later the institutions shape the chiefs of state.

There is no nation so powerful, as the one that obeys its laws not from principals of fear or reason, but from passion.

If I knew of something that could serve my nation but would ruin another, I would not propose it to my prince, for I am first a man and only then a Frenchman... because I am necessarily a man, and only accidentally am I French.

Friendship is an arrangement by which we undertake to exchange small favors for big ones.

In most things success depends on knowing how long it takes to succeed.

When the body of the people is possessed of the supreme power, it is called a democracy.

An empire founded by war has to maintain itself by war.

We must have constantly present in our minds the difference between independence and liberty. Liberty is a right of doing whatever the laws permit, and if a citizen could do what they forbid he would no longer be possessed of liberty.

You have to study a great deal to know a little.

Luxury ruins republics; poverty, monarchies.

There is only one thing that can form a bond between men, and that is gratitude... we cannot give someone else greater power over us than we have ourselves.

The spirit of moderation should also be the spirit of the lawgiver.

Weak minds exaggerate too much the wrong done to the Africans.

There are three species of government: republican, monarchical, and despotic.

False happiness renders men stern and proud, and that happiness is never communicated. True happiness renders them kind and sensible, and that happiness is always shared.

Peace is a natural effect of trade.

The object of war is victory; that of victory is conquest; and that of conquest preservation.

To love to read is to exchange hours of ennui for hours of delight.

Lunch kills half of Paris, supper the other half.

There is no one, says another, whom fortune does not visit once in his life; but when she does not find him ready to receive her, she walks in at the door, and flies out at the window.

The sublimity of administration consists in knowing the proper degree of power that should be exerted on different occasions.

Talent is a gift which God has given us secretly, and which we reveal without perceiving it.

Men, who are rogues individually, are in the mass very honorable people.

Men should be bewailed at their birth, and not at their death.

If the triangles made a god, they would give him three sides.

They who assert that a blind fatality produced the various effects we behold in this world talk very absurdly; for can anything be more unreasonable than to pretend that a blind fatality could be productive of intelligent beings?

The law of nations is naturally founded on this principle, that different nations ought in time of peace to do one another all the good they can, and in time of war as little injury as possible, without prejudicing their real interests.

The state of slavery is in its own nature bad.

Law in general is human reason, inasmuch as it governs all the inhabitants of the earth: the political and civil laws of each nation ought to be only the particular cases in which human reason is applied.

Countries are well cultivated, not as they are fertile, but as they are free.

The reason the Romans built their great paved highways was because they had such inconvenient footwear.

An author is a fool who, not content with boring those he lives with, insists on boring future generations.

Slavery, properly so called, is the establishment of a right which gives to one man such a power over another as renders him absolute master of his life and fortune.

Life was given to me as a favor, so I may abandon it when it is one no longer.

It is always the adventurers who do great things, not the sovereigns of great empires.

Author: A fool who, not content with having bored those who have lived with him, insists on tormenting generations to come.

Raillery is a mode of speaking in favor of one's wit at the expense of one's better nature.

A man should be mourned at his birth, not at his death.

Thus the creation, which seems an arbitrary act, supposes laws as invariable as those of the fatality of the Atheists. It would be absurd to say that the Creator might govern the world without those rules, since without them it could not subsist.

People here argue about religion interminably, but it appears that they are competing at the same time to see who can be the least devout.

Although born in a prosperous realm, we did not believe that its boundaries should limit our knowledge, and that the lore of the East should alone enlighten us.

In bodies moved, the motion is received, increased, diminished, or lost, according to the relations of the quantity of matter and velocity; each diversity is uniformity, each change is constancy.

The success of most things depends upon knowing how long it will take to succeed.

Success in the majority of circumstances depends on knowing how long it takes to succeed.

Not to be loved is a misfortune, but it is an insult to be loved no longer.

What orators lack in depth they make up for in length.

Man, as a physical being, is like other bodies governed by invariable laws.

Republics end through luxury; monarchies through poverty.

There are only two cases in which war is just: first, in order to resist the aggression of an enemy, and second, in order to help an ally who has been attacked.