Philosophy can be compared to some powders that are so corrosive that, after they have eaten away the infected flesh of a wound, they then devour the…

- Pierre Bayle

The furnace of affliction refines us from earthly drossiness, and softens us for the impression of God's own stamp.

- Pierre Bayle

It is pure illusion to think that an opinion which passes down from century to century, from generation to generation, may not be entirely false.

- Pierre Bayle

So that, were it the purpose of God to produce comets as signs of his wrath it would be true to say that he is quickening a false devotion almost all…

- Pierre Bayle

Do you doubt that the least effects of nature were not used as marks of the wrath of heaven? It was to the interest of pontiffs, priests, and augurs,…

- Pierre Bayle

There is not less wit nor invention in applying rightly a thought one finds in a book, than in being the first author of that thought. Cardinal du Pe…

- Pierre Bayle

If an historian were to relate truthfully all the crimes, weaknesses, and disorders of mankind, his readers would take his work for satire rather tha…

- Pierre Bayle

It has been asserted, that a moral Atheist would be a monster beyond the power of nature to create: I reply, that it is not more strange for an Athei…

- Pierre Bayle

In matters of religion, it is very easy to deceive a man and very hard to undeceive him.

- Pierre Bayle