Brutes are deprived of the high advantages which we have; but they have some which we have not. They have not our hopes, but they are without our fears; they are subject like us to death, but without knowing it; even most of them are more attentive than we to self-preservation, and do not make so bad a use of their passions.
As soon as man enters into a state of society he loses the sense of his weakness; equality ceases, and then commences the state of war. Each particular society begins to feel its strength, whence arises a state of war between different nations. The individuals likewise of each society become sensible of their force; hence the principal advantages of this society they endeavour to convert to their own emolument, which constitutes a state of war between individuals.
Better it is to say that the government most comformable to nature is that which best agrees with the humor and disposition of the people in whose favor it is established.
The public business must be carried on with a certain motion, neither too quick nor too slow.
In monarchies, policy effects great things with as little virtue as possible.
Honor sets all the parts of the body politic in motion, and by its very action connects them; thus each individual advances the public good, while he only thinks of promoting his own interest.
As virtue is necessary in a republic, and in a monarchy honour, so fear is necessary in a despotic government: with regard to virtue, there is no occasion for it, and honour would be extremely dangerous.
Excessive obedience supposes ignorance in the person that obeys: the same it supposes in him that commands, for he has no occasion to deliberate, to doubt, to reason; he has only to will.
It is not the young people that degenerate; they are not spoiled till those of maturer age are already sunk into corruption.
At our coming into the world, we contract an immense debt to our country, which we can never discharge.
[Britain is] a nation that may be justly called a republic, disguised under the form of a monarchy.
The wickedness of mankind makes it necessary for the law to suppose them better than they really are.
Democracy has, therefore, two excesses to avoid — the spirit of inequality, which leads to aristocracy or monarchy, and the spirit of extreme equality, which leads to despotic power, as the latter is completed by conquest.
If a republic be small, it is destroyed by a foreign force; if it be large, it is ruined by an internal imperfection.
It is difficult for the united states to be all of equal power and extent.
Liberty is the right of doing whatever the laws permit, and if a citizen could do what they forbid he would be no longer possessed of liberty, because all his fellow-citizens would have the same power.
Democratic and aristocratic states are not in their own nature free. Political liberty is to be found only in moderate governments; and even in these it is not always found. It is there only when there is no abuse of power. But constant experience shows us that every man invested with power is apt to abuse it, and to carry his authority as far as it will go. Is it not strange, though true, to say that virtue itself has need of limits?
This punishment of death is the remedy, as it were, of a sick society.
It is an important maxim, that we ought to be very circumspect in the prosecution of magic and heresy. The accusation of these two crimes may be vastly injurious to liberty.
The laws do not take upon them to punish any other than overt acts.
Great punishments, and consequently great changes, cannot take place without investing some citizens with an exorbitant power.
The public revenues are a portion that each subject gives of his property, in order to secure or enjoy the remainder.
The effect of wealth in a country is to inspire every heart with ambition: that of poverty is to give birth to despair. The former is excited by labour, the latter is soothed by indolence.
It is a general rule that taxes may be heavier in proportion to the liberty of the subject, and that there is a necessity for reducing them in proportion to the increase of slavery. This has always been and always will be the case. It is a rule derived from nature that never varies.
Politics are a smooth file, which cuts gradually, and attains its end by slow progression.
Mankind by their industry, and by the influence of good laws, have rendered the earth more proper for their abode.
The culture of lands requires the use of money.
The prejudices of superstition are superior to all others, and have the strongest influence on the human mind.
I shall be obliged to wander to the right and to the left, that I may investigate and discover the truth.
Liberty itself has appeared intolerable to those nations who have not been accustomed to enjoy it. Thus pure air is sometimes disagreeable to such as have lived in a fenny country.
There are two sorts of tyranny: one real, which arises from oppression; the other is seated in opinion, and is sure to be felt whenever those who govern establish things shocking to the existing ideas of a nation.
It is the business of the legislature to follow the spirit of the nation, when it is not contrary to the principles of government; for we do nothing so well as when we act with freedom, and follow the bent of our natural genius.
Vanity is as advantageous to a government as pride is dangerous.
All lazy nations are grave; for those who do not labour regard themselves as the sovereigns of those who do.
A revolution formed by liberty becomes a confirmation of liberty. A free nation may have a deliverer: a nation enslaved can have only another oppressor. For whoever is able to dethrone an absolute prince has a power sufficient to become absolute himself.
Fain would I glide down a gentle river, but I am carried away by a torrent.
Commerce is a cure for the most destructive prejudices; for it is almost a general rule that wherever we find agreeable manners, there commerce flourishes; and that wherever there is commerce, there we meet with agreeable manners.
Peace is the natural effect of trade. Two nations who traffic with each other become reciprocally dependent; for if one has an interest in buying, the other has an interest in selling: and thus their union is founded on their mutual necessities.
It is a true maxim that one nation should never exclude another from trading with it, except for very great reasons.
The avarice of nations makes them quarrel for the movables of the whole universe.
Commerce is sometimes destroyed by conquerors, sometimes cramped by monarchs; it traverses the earth, flies from the places where it is oppressed, and stays where it has liberty to breath: it reigns at present where nothing was formerly to be seen but deserts, seas, and rocks; and where it once reigned now there are only deserts.
The history of commerce is that of the communication of the people.
Slowness is frequently the cause of much greater slowness.
The first Greeks were all pirates.
Great commanders write their actions with simplicity; because they receive more glory from facts than from words.
The compass opened, if I may so express myself, the universe.
Money is a sign which represents the value of all merchandise.
I shall ever repeat it, that mankind are governed not by extremes, but by principles of moderation.
Men who have absolutely nothing, such as beggars, have many children.
There are countries where a man is worth nothing; there are others where he is worth less than nothing.
Christianity stamped its character on jurisprudence; for empire has ever a connection with the priesthood.
A man is not poor because he has nothing, but because he does not work.
The alms given to a naked man in the street do not fulfil the obligations of the state, which owes to every citizen a certain subsistence, a proper nourishment, convenient clothing, and a kind of life not incompatible with health.
It is a misfortune to human nature, when religion is given by a conqueror. The Mahometan religion, which speaks only by the sword, acts still upon men with that destructive spirit with which it was founded.
Human laws, made to direct the will, ought to give precepts, and not counsels; religion, made to influence the heart, should give many counsels, and few precepts.
Penances ought to be joined with the idea of labour, not with that of idleness; with the idea of good, not with that of supereminence; with the idea of frugality, not with that of avarice.
As both religion and the civil laws ought to have a peculiar tendency to render men good citizens, it is evident that when one of these deviates from this end, the tendency of the other ought to be strengthened. The less severity there is in religion, the more there ought to be in the civil laws.
The most true and holy doctrines may be attended with the very worst consequences when they are not connected with the principles of society: and on the contrary, doctrines the most false may be attended with excellent consequences when contrived so as to be connected with these principles.
When religion appoints a cessation from labour it ought to have a greater regard to the necessities of mankind than to the grandeur of the being it designs to honour.
Men are extremely inclined to the passions of hope and fear; a religion, therefore, that had neither a heaven nor a hell could hardly please them.
We ought not to decide by divine laws what should be decided by human laws; nor determine by human what should be determined by divine laws.
Useless laws weaken the necessary laws.
Nothing is a greater obstacle to our progress in knowledge, then a bad performance of a celebrated author; because, before we instruct we must begin with undeceiving.
Very good laws may be ill timed.