Jean-Jacques Rousseau Quotes
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Remorse goes to sleep during a prosperous period and wakes up in adversity. [Fr., Le remords s'endort durant un destin prospere et s'aigrit dans l'adversite.]
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In any case, frequent punishments are a sign of weakness or slackness in the government. There is no man so bad that he cannot be made good for something. No man should be put to death, even as an example, if he can be left to live without danger to society.
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I do not know is a phrase which becomes us.
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It is hard to prevent oneself from believing what one so keenly desires.
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Chemistry... is like the maid occupied with daily civilisation; she is busy with fertilisers, medicines, glass, insecticides ... for she dispenses the recipes.
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Universal silence is taken to imply the consent of the people.
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Every blue-stocking will remain a spinster as long as there are sensible men on the earth. [Fr., Toute fille lettree restera fille toute sa vie, quand il n'y aura que des hommes senses sur la terre.]
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Slaves lose everything in their chains, even the desire of escaping from them.
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A paralyzed man who wants to walk OR an agile man who does not want to walk will both remain neutral in nature.
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She was dull, unattractive, couldn't tell the time, count money or tie her own shoe laces... But I loved her
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One may live tranquilly in a dungeon; but does life consist in living quietly?
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Accent is the soul of language; it gives to it both feeling and truth.
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Our island is this earth; and the most striking object we behold is the sun. As soon as we pass beyond our immediate surroundings, one or both of these must meet our eye. Thus the philosophy of most savage races is mainly directed to imaginary divisions of the earth or to the divinity of the sun.
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If there were a nation of Gods, it would govern itself democratically. A government so perfect is not suited to men.
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The French, for example, are a contemptible nation.
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Our will is always for our own good, but we do not always see what that is; the people is never corrupted, but it is often deceived, and on such occasions only does it seem to will what is bad.
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There as here, passions are the motive of all action, but they are livelier, more ardent, or merely simpler and purer, thereby assuming a totally different character. All the first movements of nature are good and right.
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As for the Soothsayer, although I am certain no one feels the true beauties of that work better than I, I am far from finding these beauties in the same places as the infatuated public does. They are not the products of study and knowledge, but rather are inspired by taste and sensitivity.
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The problem is to find a form of association which will defend and protect with the whole common force the person and goods of each associate, and in which each, while uniting himself with all, may still obey himself alone, and remain as free as before.
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In a well governed state, there are few punishments, not because there are many pardons, but because criminals are rare; it is when a state is in decay that the multitude of crimes is a gaurantee of impunity.
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Peter had a genius for imitation; but he lacked true genius, which is creative and makes all from nothing.
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A country cannot subsist well without liberty, nor liberty without virtue.
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I would rather be a man of paradoxes than a man of prejudices.
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Those that are most slow in making a promise are the most faithful in the performance of it.