Voltaire Quotes- Marie Arouet (21 November 1694 – 30 May 1778), known by his nom de plume Voltaire was a French Enlightenment writer, historian, and philosopher famous for his wit, his criticism of Christianity, especially the Roman Catholic Church, and his advocacy of freedom of religion, freedom of speech, and separation of church and state.
Voltaire was a versatile and prolific writer, producing works in almost every literary form, including plays, poems, novels, essays, and historical and scientific works. He wrote more than 20,000 letters and more than 2,000 books and pamphlets.
He was an outspoken advocate of civil liberties, despite the risk this placed him under the strict censorship laws of the time. As a satirical polemicist, he frequently made use of his works to criticize intolerance, religious dogma, and the French institutions of his day.
Inspirational Voltaire Quotes
“All styles are good except the tiresome kind.”-Voltaire Quotes
“All the reasonings of men are not worth one sentiment of women.”-Voltaire Quotes
“Anyone who seeks to destroy the passions instead of controlling them is trying to play the angel.”-Voltaire Quotes
“Appreciation is a wonderful thing: It makes what is excellent in others belong to us as well.”-Voltaire Quotes
“By appreciation, we make excellence in others our own property.”-Voltaire Quotes
“Chance is a word void of sense; nothing can exist without a cause.”-Voltaire Quotes
“Clever tyrants are never punished.”-Voltaire Quotes
“Common sense is not so common.”-Voltaire Quotes
“Divorce is probably of nearly the same date as marriage. I believe, however, that marriage is some weeks the more ancient.”-Voltaire Quotes
“Doubt is not a pleasant condition, but certainty is absurd.”-Voltaire Quotes
“Each player must accept the cards life deals him or her: but once they are in hand, he or she alone must decide how to play the cards in order to win the game.”-Voltaire Quotes
Voltaire Quotes to Improve your Rational Thinking
“Every man is guilty of all the good he did not do.”-Voltaire Quotes
“Everyone goes astray, but the least imprudent are they who repent the soonest.”-Voltaire Quotes
“Everything’s fine today, that is our illusion.”-Voltaire Quotes
“Faith consists in believing when it is beyond the power of reason to believe.”-Voltaire Quotes
“Fear follows crime and is its punishment.”-Voltaire Quotes
“Friendship is the marriage of the soul, and this marriage is liable to divorce.”-Voltaire Quotes
“Froth at the top, dregs at bottom, but the middle excellent.”-Voltaire Quotes
“God gave us the gift of life; it is up to us to give ourselves the gift of living well.”-Voltaire Quotes
“God is not on the side of the big battalions, but on the side of those who shoot best.”-Voltaire Quotes
“Governments need to have both shepherds and butchers.”-Voltaire Quotes
“He is a hard man who is only just, and a sad one who is only wise.”-Voltaire Quotes
“He must be very ignorant for he answers every question he is asked.”-Voltaire Quotes
“He shines in the second rank, who is eclipsed in the first.”-Voltaire Quotes
“He was a great patriot, a humanitarian, a loyal friend; provided, of course, he really is dead.”-Voltaire Quotes
100 Inspirational Voltaire Quotes On Success
“He who has not the spirit of this age has all the misery of it.”-Voltaire Quotes
‘He who is not just is severe, he who is not wise is sad.”-Voltaire Quotes
“History is only the register of crimes and misfortunes.”-Voltaire Quotes
“History should be written as philosophy.”-Voltaire Quotes
“I am very fond of truth, but not at all of martyrdom.”-Voltaire Quotes
“I die adoring God, loving my friends, not hating my enemies, and detesting superstition.”-Voltaire Quotes
“I have never made but one prayer to God, a very short one: ‘O Lord make my enemies ridiculous.’ And God granted it.”-Voltaire Quotes
“I know many books which have bored their readers, but I know of none which has done real evil.”-Voltaire Quotes
“I should like to lie at your feet and die in your arms.”-Voltaire Quotes
“Ice-cream is exquisite – what a pity it isn’t illegal.”-Voltaire Quotes
“If God created us in his own image, we have more than reciprocated.”-Voltaire Quotes
Voltaire Quotes on Love, Life, and Freedom
“If God did not exist, it would be necessary to invent Him.”-Voltaire Quotes
“An illusion is the first of all pleasures.”-Voltaire Quotes
“In every author let us distinguish the man from his works.”-Voltaire Quotes
“In general, the art of government consists of taking as much money as possible from one class of citizens to give to another.”-Voltaire Quotes
“In the case of news, we should always wait for the sacrament of confirmation.”-Voltaire Quotes
“Indeed, history is nothing more than a tableau of crimes and misfortunes.”-Voltaire Quotes
“Injustice, in the end, produces independence.”-Voltaire Quotes
“Is there anyone so wise as to learn by the experience of others?”-Voltaire Quotes
“It is better to risk saving a guilty man than to condemn an innocent one.”-Voltaire Quotes
“It is dangerous to be right in matters on which the established authorities are wrong.”-Voltaire Quotes
“It is difficult to free fools from the chains they revere.”-Voltaire Quotes
“It is forbidden to kill; therefore all murderers are punished unless they kill in large numbers and to the sound of trumpets.”-Voltaire Quotes
Profound Voltaire Quotes About Life
“It is lamentable, that to be a good patriot one must become the enemy of the rest of mankind.”-Voltaire Quotes
“It is not enough to conquer; one must learn to seduce.”-Voltaire Quotes
“It is not sufficient to see and to know the beauty of a work. We must feel and be affected by it.”-Voltaire Quotes
“It is one of the superstitions of the human mind to have imagined that virginity could be a virtue.”-Voltaire Quotes
“It is said that the present is pregnant with the future.”-Voltaire Quotes
“It is the flash which appears, the Thunderbolt will follow.”-Voltaire Quotes
“Judge a man by his questions rather than his answers.”-Voltaire Quotes
“Let us read and let us dance – two amusements that will never do any harm to the world.”-Voltaire Quotes
“Let us work without theorizing, is the only way to make life endurable.”-Voltaire Quotes
“Life is thickly sown with thorns, and I know no other remedy than to pass quickly through them. The longer we dwell on our misfortunes, the greater is their power to harm us.”-Voltaire Quotes
Voltaire Quotes About Education
“Love is a canvas furnished by nature and embroidered by imagination.”-Voltaire Quotes
“Man is free at the moment he wishes to be.”-Voltaire Quotes
“Men use thought only as authority for their injustice, and employ speech only to conceal their thoughts.”-Voltaire Quotes
“My life is a struggle.”-Voltaire Quotes
“Nature has always had more force than education.”-Voltaire Quotes
“No problem can withstand the assault of sustained thinking.”-Voltaire Quotes
“Nothing would be more tiresome than eating and drinking if God had not made them a pleasure as well as a necessity.”-Voltaire Quotes
“Of all religions, the Christian should, of course, inspire the most tolerance, but until now Christians have been the most intolerant of all men.”-Voltaire Quotes
“One great use of words is to hide our thoughts.”-Voltaire Quotes
“One merit of poetry few persons will deny: it says more and in fewer words than prose.”-Voltaire Quotes
“Opinion has caused more trouble on this little earth than plagues or earthquakes.”-Voltaire Quotes
“Optimism is the madness of insisting that all is well when we are miserable.”-Voltaire Quotes
Voltaire Quotes About Hearts
“Paradise was made for tender hearts; hell, for loveless hearts.”-Voltaire Quotes
“Perfection is attained by slow degrees; it requires the hand of time.”-Voltaire Quotes
“Prejudices are what fools use for reason.”-Voltaire Quotes
“Religion was instituted to make us happy in this life and in the other. What must we do to be happy in the life to come? Be just.”-Voltaire Quotes
“Tears are the silent language of grief.”-Voltaire Quotes
“The ancient Romans built their greatest masterpieces of architecture, their amphitheaters, for wild beasts to fight in.”-Voltaire Quotes
“The ancients recommended us to sacrifice to the Graces, but Milton sacrificed to the Devil.”-Voltaire Quotes
“The art of medicine consists of amusing the patient while nature cures the disease.”-Voltaire Quotes
“The best government is a benevolent tyranny tempered by an occasional assassination.”-Voltaire Quotes
“The best is the enemy of the good.”-Voltaire Quotes
“The ear is the avenue to the heart.”-Voltaire Quotes
“The first step, my son, which one makes in the world, is the one on which depends on the rest of our days.”-Voltaire Quotes
Voltaire Quotes About Husband
“The Holy Roman Empire is neither Holy, nor Roman, nor an Empire.”-Voltaire Quotes
“The husband who decides to surprise his wife is often very much surprised himself.”-Voltaire Quotes
“The infinitely little have a pride infinitely great.”-Voltaire Quotes
“The instruction we find in books is like fire. We fetch it from our neighbors, kindle it at home, communicate it to others, and it becomes the property of all.”-Voltaire Quotes
“The mouth obeys poorly when the heart murmurs.”-Voltaire Quotes
“The multitude of books is making us ignorant.”-Voltaire Quotes
“The opportunity for doing mischief is found a hundred times a day, and of doing good once in a year.”-Voltaire Quotes
“The progress of rivers to the ocean is not so rapid as that of man to error.”-Voltaire Quotes
“The public is a ferocious beast; one must either chain it or flee from it.”-Voltaire Quotes
“The safest course is to do nothing against one’s conscience. With this secret, we can enjoy life and have no fear of death.”-Voltaire Quotes
“The secret of being a bore… is to tell everything.”-Voltaire Quotes
“The sovereign is called a tyrant who knows no laws but his caprice.”-Voltaire Quotes
“The true triumph of reason is that it enables us to get along with those who do not possess it.”-Voltaire Quotes
Voltaire Quotes About Religion
“The truths of religion are never so well understood as by those who have lost the power of reason.”-Voltaire Quotes
“The world embarrasses me, and I cannot dream that this watch exists and has no watchmaker.”-Voltaire Quotes
“There are truths which are not for all men, nor for all times.”-Voltaire Quotes
“Think for yourselves and let others enjoy the privilege to do so, too.”-Voltaire Quotes
“This self-love is the instrument of our preservation; it resembles the provision for the perpetuity of mankind: it is necessary, it is dear to us, it gives us pleasure, and we must conceal it.”-Voltaire Quotes
“Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities.”-Voltaire Quotes
“Time, which alone makes the reputation of men, ends by making their defects respectable.”-Voltaire Quotes
“To believe in God is impossible not to believe in Him is absurd.”-Voltaire Quotes
“To hold a pen is to be at war.”-Voltaire Quotes
“To succeed in the world it is not enough to be stupid, you must also be well-mannered.”-Voltaire Quotes
“To the living we owe respect, but to the dead, we owe only the truth.”-Voltaire Quotes
Voltaire Quotes About Sucess
“To the wicked, everything serves as pretext.”-Voltaire Quotes
“Tyrants have always some slight shade of virtue; they support the laws before destroying them.”-Voltaire Quotes
“Use, do not abuse… neither abstinence nor excess ever renders a man happy.”-Voltaire Quotes
“Very learned women are to be found, in the same manner as female warriors; but they are seldom or ever inventors.”-Voltaire Quotes
“Very often, say what you will, a knave is only a fool.”-Voltaire Quotes
“We are all full of weakness and errors; let us mutually pardon each other our follies – it is the first law of nature.”-Voltaire Quotes
“We are rarely proud when we are alone.”-Voltaire Quotes
“We cannot always oblige, but we can always speak obligingly.”-Voltaire Quotes
“We cannot wish for that we know not.”-Voltaire Quotes
“We have a natural right to make use of our pens as of our tongue, at our peril, risk, and hazard.”-Voltaire Quotes
Voltaire Quotes About Energy
“We must distinguish between speaking to deceive and being silent to be reserved.”-Voltaire Quotes
“We never live; we are always in the expectation of living.”-Voltaire Quotes
“Weakness on both sides is, as we know, the motto of all quarrels.”-Voltaire Quotes
“What a heavy burden is a name that has become too famous.”-Voltaire Quotes
“What most persons consider as virtue, after the age of 40 is simply a loss of energy.”-Voltaire Quotes
“What then do you call your soul? What idea have you of it? You cannot of yourselves, without revelation, admit the existence within you of anything but a power unknown to you of feeling and thinking.”-Voltaire Quotes
“When he to whom one speaks does not understand, and he who speaks himself does not understand, that is metaphysics.”-Voltaire Quotes
“When it is a question of money, everybody is of the same religion.”-Voltaire Quotes
“When men do not have healthy notions of the Divinity, false ideas supplant them, just as in bad times one uses counterfeit money when there is no good money.”-Voltaire Quotes
Voltaire Quotes About Country
“Wherever there is a settled society, religion is necessary; the laws cover manifest crimes, and religion covers secret crimes.”-Voltaire Quotes
“Who serves his country well has no need of ancestors.”-Voltaire Quotes
“Woe to the makers of literal translations, who by rendering every word weaken the meaning! It is indeed by so doing that we can say the letter kills and the spirit gives life.”-Voltaire Quotes
