Jean-Jacques Rousseau Quotes
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Insults are the arguments employed by those who are in the wrong.
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There are times when I am so unlike myself that I might be taken for someone else of an entirely opposite character.
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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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The more humanity owes him, the more society denies him. Every door is shut against him, even when he has a right to its being opened: and if he ever obtains justice, it is with much greater difficulty than others obtain favors.
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Frequent punishments are always a sign of weakness or laziness on the part of a government.
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L'offenseur ne pardonne jamais.1
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A citizen should render to the state all the services he can as soon as the sovereign demands them.
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Taste is, so to speak, the microscope of the judgment.
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What good would it be to possess the whole universe if one were its only survivor?
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We are born, so to speak, twice over; born into existence, and born into life; born a human being, and born a man.
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Interest is the spur of the people, but glory that of great souls.
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The truth brings no man a fortune.
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Education is either from nature, from man or from things. The developing of our faculties and organs is the education of nature; that of man is the application we learn to make of this very developing; and that of things is the experience we acquire in regard to the different objects by which we are affected. All that we have not at our birth, and that we stand in need of at the years of maturity, is the gift of education.
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He who eats in idleness that which he himself has not earned, steals it; and a capitalist whom the state pays for doing nothing differs little in my eyes from a brigand, who lives at the expense of passers-by.
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I prefer liberty with danger than peace with slavery.
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Inopportune consolations increase a deep sorrow.
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Never did I think so much, exist so much, be myself so much as in the journeys I have made alone and on foot. Walking has something about it which animates and enlivens my ideas. I can hardly think while I am still; my body must be in motion to move my mind.
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Ordinary readers, forgive my paradoxes: one must make them when one reflects; and whatever you may say, I prefer being a man with paradoxes than a man with prejudices.
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Oh providence! Oh nature! Treasure of the poor, resource of the unfortunate. The person who feels, knows your holy laws and trusts them, the person whose heart is at peace and whose body does not suffer, thanks to you is not entirely prey to adversity.
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The money you have gives you freedom; the money you pursue enslaves you.
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It is in man's heart that the life of nature's spectacle exists; to see it, one must feel it.
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Foxley translation
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I would rather be a man of paradoxes than a man of prejudices.
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We should not teach children the sciences; but give them a taste for them.