43 Quotes by Jean Rousseau
- Those that are most slow in making a promise are the most faithful in the performance of it.
- It is too difficult to think nobly when one thinks only of earning a living.
- The world of reality has its limits; the world of imagination is boundless.
- However great a man's natural talent may be, the act of writing cannot be learned all at once.
- How many famous and high-spirited heroes have lived a day too long?
- Heroes are not known by the loftiness of their carriage; the greatest braggarts are generally the merest cowards.
- The English think they are free. They are free only during the election of members of parliament.
- The first step towards vice is to shroud innocent actions in mystery, and whoever likes to conceal something sooner or later has reason to conceal it.
- The person who has lived the most is not the one with the most years but the one with the richest experiences.
- Gratitude is a duty which ought to be paid, but which none have a right to expect.
- The body politic, as well as the human body, begins to die as soon as it is born, and carries itself the causes of its destruction.
- People who know little are usually great talkers, while men who know much say little.
- Patience is bitter, but its fruit is sweet.
- Our will is always for our own good, but we do not always see what that is.
- Our greatest evils flow from ourselves.
- Our affections as well as our bodies are in perpetual flux.
- Nature never deceives us; it is we who deceive ourselves.
- Most nations, as well as people are impossible only in their youth; they become incorrigible as they grow older.
- Man is born free, and everywhere he is in shackles.
- Money is the seed of money, and the first guinea is sometimes more difficult to acquire than the second million.
- The training of children is a profession, where we must know how to waste time in order to save it.
- Take from the philosopher the pleasure of being heard and his desire for knowledge ceases.
- Plant and your spouse plants with you; weed and you weed alone.
- The English are predisposed to pride, the French to vanity.
- Free people, remember this maxim: we may acquire liberty, but it is never recovered if it is once lost.
- You forget that the fruits belong to all and that the land belongs to no one.
- Remorse sleeps during prosperity but awakes bitter consciousness during adversity.
- When something an affliction happens to you, you either let it defeat you, or you defeat it.
- We should not teach children the sciences; but give them a taste for them.
- We pity in others only the those evils which we ourselves have experienced.
- We do not know what is really good or bad fortune.
- We are born weak, we need strength; helpless, we need aid; foolish, we need reason. All that we lack at birth, all that we need when we come to man's estate, is the gift of education.
- To endure is the first thing that a child ought to learn, and that which he will have the most need to know.
- All of my misfortunes come from having thought too well of my fellows.
- Force does not constitute right... obedience is due only to legitimate powers.
- Take the course opposite to custom and you will almost always do well.
- Absolute silence leads to sadness. It is the image of death.
- Although modesty is natural to man, it is not natural to children. Modesty only begins with the knowledge of evil.
- Base souls have no faith in great individuals.
- Childhood is the sleep of reason.
- Falsehood has an infinity of combinations, but truth has only one mode of being.
- Fame is but the breath of people, and that often unwholesome.
- A feeble body weakens the mind.
Privacy policy
