Voltaire

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

Is there anyone so wise as to learn by the experience of others?

Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities.

And ask each passenger to tell his story, and if there is one of them all who has not cursed his existence many times, and said to himself over and over again that he was the most miserable of men, I give you permission to throw me head-first into the sea.

I would rather obey a fine lion, much stronger than myself, than two hundred rats of my own species.

It is far better to be silent than merely to increase the quantity of bad books.

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.)

Liberty of thought is the life of the soul.

Faith consists in believing what reason cannot.

Whatever you do, crush the infamous thing, and love those who love you.

But for what purpose was the earth formed?" asked Candide. "To drive us mad," replied Martin.

It is with books as with men: a very small number play a great part.

Whoever serves his country well has no need of ancestors.

He shines in the second rank, who is eclipsed in the first.

In every author let us distinguish the man from his works.

The truths of religion are never so well understood as by those who have lost the power of reason.

Our country is that spot to which our heart is bound.

Satire lies about literary men while they live and eulogy lies about them when they die.

The ancients recommended us to sacrifice to the Graces, but Milton sacrificed to the Devil.

Nature has always had more force than education.

History should be written as philosophy.