There are truths which are not for all men, nor for all times.
La vie est hérissée de ces épines, et je n'y sais d'autre remède que de cultiver son jardin.
(Life is bristling with thorns, and I know no other remedy than to cultivate one's garden. )
"Si Dieu n'existait pas, il faudrait l'inventer." Mais toute la nature nous crie qu'il existe; qu'il y a une intelligence suprême, un pouvoir immense, un ordre admirable, et tout nous instruit de notre dépendance.
("If God did not exist, He would have to be invented." But all nature cries aloud that he does exist: that there is a supreme intelligence, an immense power, an admirable order, and everything teaches us our own dependence on it. )
Un bon mot ne prouve rien. (A witty saying proves nothing. )
My personal favourite:
Qui plume a, guerre a. -To hold a pen is to be at war.
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Voltaire: Not a day goes by without our using the word optimism, coined by Voltaire against Leibniz, who had demonstrated that we live in the best of possible worlds. Voltaire, very reasonably, denied that exhorbitant opinion... Leibniz could have replied that a world which has given us Voltaire has some right to be considered the best. (credit: wikipedia)
"What we find in books is like the fire in our hearths. We fetch it from our neighbor's, we kindle it at home, we communicate it to others, and it becomes the property of all." -Voltaire
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Wow. I'm absolutely captivated by him! Okay the weirdest thing sparked off the wiki search on him: Jon and his french-ness. But yeah. Voltaire is the pen name of François-Marie Arouet. He was a writer, philosopher, playwright. And wow do I love his quotes. But what struck me most was his stand on religion! And well yeah. If you want, you can go read more about him. I have absolutely no time or i'd love to pour over his works. The Maid of Orleans etc.
Night, love! (;