Prejudices are what fools use for reason.
We are intelligent beings: intelligent beings cannot have been formed by a crude, blind, insensible being: there is certainly some difference between the ideas of Newton and the dung of a mule. Newton's intelligence, therefore, came from another intelligence
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote emphasizes the belief that intelligent beings cannot originate from a mindless or chaotic force, highlighting the superiority of human intellect compared to simpler forms of existence.
In this quote, Voltaire argues that the complexity and brilliance of human intelligence, exemplified by figures like Newton, cannot be explained by mere chance or the actions of a mindless entity. He suggests that there is a distinct level of intelligence that arises from a higher form of intelligence, indicating that true understanding and creativity must come from a source that possesses similar qualities. This line of reasoning underlines a philosophical stance on the origins of intelligence and the nature of existence.
Themes
In practice
Example use cases
In a debate about the origins of intelligence, this quote could serve to argue against random chance.
More from Voltaire
All quotes →He was a great patriot, a humanitarian, a loyal friend; provided, of course, he really is dead.
It is dangerous to be right in matters where established men are wrong.
It is not sufficient to see and to know the beauty of a work. We must feel and be affected by it.
We are all full of weakness and errors; let us mutually pardon each other our follies - it is the first law of nature.
It is better to risk saving a guilty man than to condemn an innocent one.
Similar quotes
Remember Old Nan's stories, Bran. Remember the way she told them, the sound of her voice. So long as you do that, part of her will always be alive in you.
Slave camps under the flag of freedom, massacres justified by philanthropy or the taste of the superhuman, cripple judgment. On the day when crime puts on the apparel of innocence, through a curious reversal peculiar to our age, it is innocence that is called on to justify itself. The purpose of this essay is to accept and study that strange challenge.
My ancestors were Brahmins. They spent their lives in search of god. I am spending my life in search of man.
We're living in an age of genocide. ...And we do believe that there is not only the genocide of war, and the genocide that took place with the extermination of the Jews, but the whole program....of birth control and abortion is another form of genocide.... [T]hey claim the poor are bringing forth tremendous numbers of children and so the solution is to kill them off.
I believe, to be sure, that any man who reaches Heaven will find that what he abandoned (even in plucking out his right eye) has not been lost: that the kernel of what he was really seeking even in his most depraved wishes will be there, beyond expectation, waiting for him in 'the High Countries'.
A person is an individual substance of a rational nature.