Ernest Renan Quotes
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The only way of salvation for the world is by returning to thy allegiance.... Firm in my faith, I shall have force to withstand my evil counsellors, my skepticism, which leads me to doubt of the people, my restless spirit which, after truth has been brought to light, impels to go on searching for it.
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The prayer of the agnostic: "O God, if there is a God, save my soul if I have a soul."
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Getting its history wrong is part of being a nation.
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In morals, truth is but little prized when it is a mere sentiment, and only attains its full value when realized in the world as fact.
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True Christianity, which will last forever, comes from the gospel words of Christ not from the epistles of Paul. The writings of Paul have been a danger and a hidden rock, the causes of the principal defects of Christian theology.
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Human cruelty took the form of a pact with the deity. A solemn oath was made to kill everything, in which people forbade themselves any display of reason or compassion. A city or a land was devoted to destruction and it was believed an insult to God if one did not observe the abominable oath.
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As a rule, all heroism is due to a lack of reflection, and thus it is necessary to maintain a mass of imbeciles. If they once understand themselves the ruling men will be lost.
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Muslims are the first victims of Islam. To liberate a Muslim from his religion is the best service that one can render him!
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He whom God has touched will always be a being apart: he is, whatever he may do, a stranger among men; he is marked by a sign.
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Man makes holy what he believes as he makes beautiful what he loves.
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To act well in this world, one must sacrifice all personal desires. The people who become missionaries of religious thought have no other Fatherland than this thought. Man is not on Earth merely to be happy, nor even simply to be honest. He is here to realize great things for humanity, to attain nobility, and to surmount the vulgarity of nearly every individual.
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Sometimes they reasoned thus: "The Messiah ought to do such a thing, now Jesus is the Messiah, therefore Jesus has done such a thing." At other times, by an inverse process, it was said: "Such a thing has happened to Jesus; now Jesus is the Messiah; therefore such a thing was to happen to the Messiah."
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Forgetfulness, and I would even say historical error, are essential in the creation of a nation.
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A nation has a soul, a spiritual principle. One is in the past, the other in the present. One is the possession of a rich legacy of memories; the other is the desire to live together and to value the common heritage.
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All history is incomprehensible without Christ.
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The epic disappeared along with the age of personal heroism; there can be no epic with artillery.
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The ignorance of French society gives one a rough sense of the infinite.
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I can die when I wish to: that is my elixir of life.
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Muslims are the first victims of Islam. Many times I have observed in my travels in the Orient that fanaticism comes from a small number of dangerous men who maintain the others in the practice of religion by terror. To liberate the Muslim from his religion is the best service one can render him.
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Morality has been conceived up to the present in a very narrow spirit, as obedience to a law, as inner struggle between opposite laws. As for me, I declare that when I do good I obey no one, I fight no battle and win no victory. The cultivated person has only to follow the delicious incline of his or her inner impulses. Be beautiful and then do at each moment whatever your heart may inspire you to do. This is the whole of morality.
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To conceive the good, in fact, is not sufficient; it must be made to succeed among men. To accomplish this less pure paths must be followed.
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To be able to think freely, a man must be certain that no consequence will follow whatever he writes.
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All the great things of humanity have been accomplished in the name of absolute principles.
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The simplest schoolboy is now familiar with truths for which Archimedes would have sacrificed his life.