Voltaire Quotes on Man (35 Quotes)

All men are by nature free; you have therefore an undoubted liberty to depart whenever you please, but will have many and great difficulties to encounter in passing the frontiers.

And ask each passenger to tell his story, and if there is one of them all who has not cursed his existence many times, and said to himself over and over again that he was the most miserable of men, I give you permission to throw me head-first into the sea.

Martin in particular concluded that man was born to live either in the convulsions of misery, or in the lethargy of boredom.

When a man is in love, jealous, and just whipped by the Inquisition, he is no longer himself.

Man can have only a certain number of teeth, hair and ideas there comes a time when he necessarily loses his teeth, hair and ideas.

'You are right,' said Pangloss, 'for when man was placed in the Garden of Eden, he was placed there ut operaretur eum, to dress it and keep it which proves that man was not born for idleness.'

Virtue is everywhere the same, because it comes from God, while everything else is of men.

All the reasonings of men are not worth one sentiment of women.

Men argue nature acts.

Men use thought only as authority for their injustice, and employ speech only to conceal their thoughts.

Men who are occupied in the restoration of health to other men, by the joint exertion of skill and humanity, are above all the great of the earth. They even partake of divinity, since to preserve and renew is almost as noble as to create.

Your destiny is that of a man, and your vows those of a god.

The poor man is never free he serves in every country

Men hate the individual whom they call avaricious only because nothing can be gained from him.

Of all religions, the Christian should of course inspire the most tolerance, but until now Christians have been the most intolerant of all men.

We must cultivate our own garden. When man was put in the garden of Eden he was put there so that he should work, which proves that man was not born to rest.

Judge a man by his questions rather than his answers.

Judge a man by his questions rather than by his answers.

Now, now my good man, this is no time for making enemies.

Man is free at the moment he wishes to be.

There are truths which are not for all men, nor for all times.

A fool is a person who guesses and gets it wrong, a clever man is one who guesses, regardless of time period, and gets it right

Men appear to prefer to ruin one another's fortunes, and to cut each other's throats over a few miserable villages, than to extend the means of human happiness

The punishment of criminals should serve a purpose. When a man is hanged he is useless.

Every man is the creature of the age in which he lives very few are able to raise themselves above the ideas of the time.

I doubt not that in due time, when the arts are brought to perfection, some means will be found to give a sound head to a man who has none at all

The punishment of criminals should be of use when a man is hanged he is good for nothing

Men are in general so tricky, so envious, so cruel, that when we find one who is only weak, we are happy.

The individual who prosecutes a man, his brother, because he is not of the same opinion, is a monster.

Men use thought only to justify their wrongdoings, And speech only to conceal their thoughts.

The progress of rivers to the ocean is not so rapid as that of man to error.

Time, which alone makes the reputation of men, ends by making their defects respectable.

All men are born with a nose and ten fingers, but no one was born with a knowledge of God.

In every author let us distinguish the man from his works.

Every man is guilty of all the good he did not do.