The Best Denis Diderot quotes

What a fine comedy this world would be if one did not play a part in it. — Denis Diderot

Posterity for the philosopher is what the other world is for the religious man. — Denis Diderot

Do you see this egg? With this you can topple every theological theory, every church or temple in the world. — Denis Diderot

The world is the house of the strong. — Denis Diderot

People praise virtue, but they hate it, they run away from it. It freezes you to death, and in this world you’ve got to keep your feet warm. — Denis Diderot

Virtue is praised but hated. people run away from it, for it is ice–cold and in this world you must keep your feet warm. — Denis Diderot

Le public ne sait pas toujours de sirer le vrai. Thepublicdoesnot alwaysknowhow todesirethetruth. — Denis Diderot

Scepticism is the first step toward truth. — Denis Diderot

Ignorance is less remote from the truth than prejudice. — Denis Diderot

I can be expected to look for truth but not to fInd It. — Denis Diderot

What has not been examined impartially has not been well examined. Skepticism is therefore the first step towards truth. — Denis Diderot

A thing is not proved because no one has ever questioned it… Skepticism is the first step toward truth. — Denis Diderot

One may demand of me that I should seek truth, but not that I should find it. — Denis Diderot

Whether God exists or does not exist, He has come to rank among the most sublime and useless truths. — Denis Diderot

We swallow greedily any lie that flatters us, but we sip only little by little at a truth we find bitter. — Denis Diderot

If ever anybody dedicated his whole life to the ‘enthusiasm for truth and justice’ using this phrase in the good sense it was Diderot. — Denis Diderot

Only a very bad theologian would confuse the certainty that follows revelation with the truths that are revealed. They are entirely different things. — Denis Diderot

I like better for one to say some foolish thing upon important matters than to be silent. That becomes the subject of discussion and dispute, and the truth is discovered. — Denis Diderot

Pithy sentences are like sharp nails which force truth upon our memory. — Denis Diderot

We swallow with one gulp the lie that flatters us, and drink drop by drop the truth which is bitter to us. — Denis Diderot

Those who fear the facts will forever try to discredit the fact–finders. — Denis Diderot

In order to get as much fame as one’s father one has to much more able than he. — Denis Diderot

What is a monster? A being whose survival is incompatible with the existing order. — Denis Diderot

In order to shake a hypothesis, it is sometimes not necessary to do anything more than push it as far as it will go. — Denis Diderot

My friend, you should blow out your candle in order to find your way more clearly. — Denis Diderot

Watch out for the fellow who talks about putting things in order! Putting things in order always means getting other people under your control. — Denis Diderot

Man will never be free until the last king is strangled with the entrails of the last priest. — Denis Diderot

Life is but a series of misunderstandings. — Denis Diderot

Integrity is the evidence of all civil virtues. — Denis Diderot

There is only one virtue, justice; only one duty, to be happy; only one corollary, not to overvalue life and not to fear death. — Denis Diderot

We are far more liable to catch the vices than the virtues of our associates. — Denis Diderot

Justice is the first virtue of those who command, and stops the complaints of those who obey. — Denis Diderot

The first step towards philosophy is incredulity. — Denis Diderot

Skepticism is the first step on the road to philosophy. — Denis Diderot

Passions destroy more prejudices than philosophy does. — Denis Diderot

Philosophy is as far separated from impiety as religion is from fanaticism. — Denis Diderot

I discuss with myself questions of politics, love, taste, or philosophy. I let my mind rove wantonly, give it free rein to followany idea, wise or mad that may present itself. My ideas are my harlots. — Denis Diderot

There is no moral precept that does not have something inconvenient about it. — Denis Diderot

There is only one passion, the passion for happiness. — Denis Diderot

We are constantly railing against the passions; we ascribe to them all of man’s afflictions, and we forget that they are also the source of all his pleasures. — Denis Diderot

One declaims endlessly against the passions; one imputes all of man’s suffering to them. One forgets that they are also the source of all his pleasures. — Denis Diderot

Only passions, great passions can elevate the soul to great things. — Denis Diderot

Only passions, and great passions, can raise the soul to great things. Without them there is no sublimity, either in morals or in creativity. Art returns to infancy, and virtue becomes small–minded. — Denis Diderot

It is said that desire is a product of the will, but the converse is in fact true: will is a product of desire. — Denis Diderot

Only God and some few rare geniuses can keep forging ahead into novelty. — Denis Diderot

Our observation of nature must be diligent, our reflection profound, and our experiments exact. We rarely see these three means combined; and for this reason, creative geniuses are not common. — Denis Diderot

Evil always turns up in this world through some genius or other. — Denis Diderot

Oh! how near are genius and madness! Men imprison them and chain them, or raise statues to them. — Denis Diderot

Gaiety––a quality of ordinary men. genius always presupposes some disorder in the machine. — Denis Diderot

The general interest of The masses might take The place of The insight of genius if it were allowed freedom of action. — Denis Diderot

Genius is present in every age, but the men carrying it within them remain benumbed unless extraordinary events occur to heat up and melt the mass so that it flows forth. — Denis Diderot