Prejudices are what fools use for reason.
VoltaireRead
Fools admire everything in an author of reputation.
Interpretation
What this quote means
This quote suggests that many people are inclined to admire anyone who is well-known, regardless of their true worth or contributions.
Voltaire's quote reflects on the tendency of individuals to idolize and admire well-known authors and public figures without critically assessing their work. It points to the superficial nature of such admiration, suggesting that true appreciation for an author's talent and ideas requires deeper understanding and discernment, rather than simply following popular opinion.
Themes
AdmirationAuthorshipCritiqueSuperficialityWisdom
In practice
Example use cases
This quote can be used during a literary discussion to challenge admiration based solely on fame.
More from Voltaire
All quotes βHe was a great patriot, a humanitarian, a loyal friend; provided, of course, he really is dead.
VoltaireRead
It is dangerous to be right in matters where established men are wrong.
VoltaireRead
It is not sufficient to see and to know the beauty of a work. We must feel and be affected by it.
VoltaireRead
We are all full of weakness and errors; let us mutually pardon each other our follies - it is the first law of nature.
VoltaireRead
It is better to risk saving a guilty man than to condemn an innocent one.
VoltaireRead
Similar quotes
It doesn't really matter how much of the rules or the dogma we accepted and lived by if we're not really living by the fundamental creed of the Catholic Church, which is service to others and finding God in ourselves and then seeing God in everyone - including our enemies.
Martin SheenRead
I can truly say, after an experience of seventy years, that all the cares and anxieties, the trials and disappointments of my whole life, are light, when balanced with my sufferings in childhood and youth from the theological dogmas which I sincerely believed. . . . The memory of my own suffering has prevented me from ever shadowing one young soul with the superstitions of the Christian religion.
Elizabeth Cady StantonRead
We have to ask ourselves, 'What kind of world is it where a baby-food executive substitutes artificial flavoring and sugar for apple juice? What kind of businesses have we created when we even lie to infants?'
Paul HawkenRead
I look at anything in nature and how things work - the stars, the pyramids - and I can't imagine that there's not some kind of design to it all. There's got to be something big that we don't understand. I do believe in Jesus. I believe in being good to one another. Life is about spending our time here contributing and not taking away. That's my faith.
Ellen DegeneresRead
On the question of the world as a whole, science founders. For scientific knowledge the world lies in fragments, the more so the more precise our scientific knowledge becomes.
Karl JaspersRead
Gide and I have attained such perfect intellectual communion that I experience the appropriate labor pains for every thought he gives birth to!
Susan SontagRead