A dash of Voltaire

"A feast not only of wit and eloquence but of warm friendship, humane feeling, and incisive thought." - Will and Ariel Durant on Voltaire's Letters

François-Marie Arouet (November 21, 1694 – May 30, 1778), known by his nom de plume Voltaire), was a French Enlightenment writer, historian, and philosopher famous for his wit, his attacks on the established Catholic Church, and his advocacy of freedom of religion, freedom of expression, and separation of church and state.  Voltaire produced 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, despite the risk this placed him in 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.

The name "Voltaire", which the author adopted in 1718, is an anagram of "AROVET LI," the Latinized spelling of his surname, Arouet, and the initial letters of "le jeune" ("the young"). The name also echoes in reverse order the syllables of the name of a family château in the Poitou region: "Airvault". The adoption of the name "Voltaire" following his incarceration at the Bastille is seen by many to mark Voltaire's formal separation from his family and his past.

In 1726, Voltaire responded to an insult from the young French nobleman Chevalier de Rohan, whose servants beat him a few days later. Since Voltaire was seeking compensation, and was even willing to fight in a duel, the aristocratic Rohan family obtained a royal lettre de cachet, a decree signed by the French King (Louis XV, in the time of Voltaire) which was routinely used to dispose of troublemakers of many kinds (drunkards, violent people, unequal marriages, and so on). This warrant caused Voltaire to be imprisoned in the Bastille without a trial and without an opportunity to defend himself. Fearing an indefinite prison sentence, Voltaire suggested that he be exiled to England as an alternative punishment, which the French authorities accepted.  This incident marked the beginning of Voltaire's attempts to reform the French judicial system. Source: Wikipedia

Following is a selection of a few of Voltaire's greatest hits. 

“Let us read, and let us dance; these two amusements will never do any harm to the world.”

“Ice-cream is exquisite. What a pity it isn't illegal.”

"The Inquisition is an admirable and wholly Christian invention to make the pope and the monks more powerful and turn a whole kingdom into hypocrites."

“‎Life is a shipwreck, but we must not forget to sing in the lifeboats.”

“It is forbidden to kill; therefore all murderers are punished unless they kill in large numbers and to the sound of trumpets."

“The more I read, the more I acquire, the more certain I am that I know nothing.”

"Let us ... reject all superstition in order to become more human; but in speaking against fanaticism, let us not imitate the fanatics: they are sick men in delirium who want to chastise their doctors. Let us assuage their ills, and never embitter them, and let us pour drop by drop into their souls the divine balm of toleration, which they would reject with horror if it were offered to them all at once."

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

Common sense is not so common.”

“I have never made but one prayer to God, a very short one: Oh Lord, make my enemies ridiculous. And God granted it."

“I don’t know where I am going, but I am on my way.”

"What most persons consider as virtue, after the age of 40 is simply a loss of energy".

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

“God is a circle whose center is everywhere and circumference nowhere.”

“The most important decision you make is to be in a good mood.”

“It is better to risk saving a guilty person than to condemn an innocent one.”

“I do not agree with what you have to say, but I'll defend to the death your right to say it.” 

“If God did not exist, it would be necessary to invent him.”

"God is not on the side of the big battalions, but on the side of those who shoot best."

"Of all religions the Christian is without doubt the one which should inspire tolerance most, although up to now the Christians have been the most intolerant of all men."

"Christian: A good-natured, simple fellow; a true lamb of the fold, who, in the innocence of his heart, persuades himself that he firmly believes unbelievable things that his priests have told him to believe, especially those he cannot even imagine. Consequently, he is convinced that three x's make fifteen, that God was made man, that he was hanged and rose to life again, that priests cannot lie, and that all who do not believe in priests will be damned without remission."

“The human brain is a complex organ with the wonderful power of enabling man to find reasons for continuing to believe whatever it is that he wants to believe.”

“Prejudices are what fools use for reason.”

We never live; we are always in the expectation of living.”

“Sensual pleasure passes and vanishes, but the friendship between us, the mutual confidence, the delight of the heart, the enchantment of the soul, these things do not perish and can never be destroyed.”

“The art of medicine consists of amusing the patient while nature cures the disease.”

“What is history? The lie that everyone agrees on...”

“Don't think money does everything or you are going to end up doing everything for money.”

“If this is the best of possible worlds, what then are the others?”

“No problem can stand the assault of sustained thinking.”

“Everything's fine today, that is our illusion."

“Uncertainty is an uncomfortable position. But certainty is an absurd one.”

“Beware of the words "internal security," for they are the eternal cry of the oppressor.”

“The instruction we find in books is like fire. We fetch it from our neighbours, kindle it at home, communicate it to others, and it becomes the property of all.”

“The safest course is to do nothing against one's conscience. With this secret, we can enjoy life and have no fear from death.”

God gave us the gift of life; it is up to us to give ourselves the gift of living well.”

“One always begins with the simple, then comes the complex, and by superior enlightenment one often reverts in the end to the simple. Such is the course of human intelligence.”

“We all look for happiness, but without knowing where to find it: like drunkards who look for their house, knowing dimly that they have one”

“The secret of being boring is to say everything.”

"Life is a shipwreck but we must keep singing whilst in the lifeboats.”

“Now, now my good man, this is no time to be making enemies." (Voltaire on his deathbed in response to a priest asking him that he renounce Satan.)”

"I die adoring God, loving my friends, not hating my enemies, and detesting superstition."