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Government
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The best government is a benevolent tyranny tempered by an occasional assassination.
-Voltaire (François-Marie Arouet)
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Greed
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Men hate the individual whom they call avaricious only because nothing can be gained from him.
-Voltaire (François-Marie Arouet)
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Guilt
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Every man is guilty of all the good he didn't do.
-Voltaire (François-Marie Arouet)
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History
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History is only the pattern of silken slippers descending the stairs to the thunder of hobnailed boots climbing upward from below.
-Voltaire (François-Marie Arouet)
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History is nothing but a pack of tricks that we play upon the dead.
-Voltaire (François-Marie Arouet)
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History is just the portrayal of crimes and misfortunes.
-Voltaire (François-Marie Arouet)
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Honesty
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The great consolation in life is to say what one thinks.
-Voltaire (François-Marie Arouet)
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Hope
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I am a little deaf, a little blind, a little impotent, and on top of this are two or three abominable infirmities, but nothing destroys my hope.
-Voltaire (François-Marie Arouet)
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Imagination
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I believe that there never was a creator of a philosophical system who did not confess at the end of his life that he had wasted his time. It must be admitted that the inventors of the mechanical arts have been much more useful to men that the inventors of syllogisms. He who imagined a ship towers considerably above him who imagined innate ideas.
-Voltaire (François-Marie Arouet)
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Innovation
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Originality is nothing but judicious plagiarism.
-Voltaire (François-Marie Arouet)
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Law
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I was never ruined but twice; once when I lost a lawsuit and once when I won one.
-Voltaire (François-Marie Arouet)
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Laziness
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Shun idleness is the rust that attaches itself to the most brilliant metals.
-Voltaire (François-Marie Arouet)
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Life
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We never live; we are always in the expectation of living.
-Voltaire (François-Marie Arouet)
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My life is a battle.
-Voltaire (François-Marie Arouet)
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Literary
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'That is indisputable,' was the answer, 'but in this country it is a good thing to kill an admiral from time to time to encourage the others.'
-Voltaire (François-Marie Arouet), Candide
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Love
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Love is a canvas furnished by Nature and embroidered by imagination.
-Voltaire (François-Marie Arouet)
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Manners
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We cannot always oblige; but we can always speak obligingly.
-Voltaire (François-Marie Arouet)
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To succeed in the world it is not enough to be stupid, you must also be well-mannered.
-Voltaire (François-Marie Arouet)
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Marriage
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Marriage is the only adventure open to the cowardly.
-Voltaire (François-Marie Arouet)
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Medicine
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The art of medicine consists of amusing the patient while nature cures the disease.
-Voltaire (François-Marie Arouet)
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Mistakes
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We are all full of weakness and errors; let us mutually pardon each other our follies it is the first law of nature.
-Voltaire (François-Marie Arouet)
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Money
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When it is a question of money, everybody is of the same religion.
-Voltaire (François-Marie Arouet)
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Multiculturalism
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If there were only one religion in England there would be danger of despotism, if there were two, they would cut each other's throats, but there are thirty, and they live in peace and happiness.
-Voltaire (François-Marie Arouet)
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Nation, Nationality, Nationalism
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How I like the boldness of the English, how I like the people who say what they think!
-Voltaire (François-Marie Arouet)
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Necessity
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The superfluous is very necessary.
-Voltaire (François-Marie Arouet)
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Books by and about Voltaire (François-Marie Arouet)