We swallow with one gulp the lie that flatters us, and drink drop by drop the truth which is bitter to us.
Interpretation
People often accept comforting lies easily, while they struggle to confront uncomfortable truths.
This quote highlights the tendency of human beings to embrace flattering lies over difficult truths. Diderot suggests that while we quickly accept what makes us feel good, we approach reality cautiously and reluctantly, often savoring the bitter taste of truthβa reminder of the complexities of our understanding and acceptance of reality.
In practice
In a motivational speech about facing reality, remind your audience of Diderot's insight.
The arbitrary rule of a just and enlightened prince is always bad. His virtues are the most dangerous and the surest form of seduction: they lull a people imperceptibly into the habit of loving, respecting, and serving his successor, whoever that successor may be, no matter how wicked or stupid.
This root [the potato], no matter how much you prepare it, is tasteless and floury. It cannot pass for an agreeable food, but it supplies a food sufficiently abundant and sufficiently healthy for men who ask only to sustain themselves. The potato is criticized with reason for being windy, but what matters windiness for the vigorous organisms of peasants and laborers?
Do you see this egg? With this you can topple every theological theory, every church or temple in the world.
There are three principal means of acquiring knowledge... observation of nature, reflection, and experimentation. Observation collects facts; reflection combines them; experimentation verifies the result of that combination.
In order to get as much fame as one's father one has to much more able than he.
All abstract sciences are nothing but the study of relations between signs.
We have committed the Golden Rule to memory; let us now commit it to life.
Be advised what thou dost discourse of, and what thou maintainest whether touching religion, state, or vanity; for if thou err in the first, thou shalt be accounted profane; if in the second, dangerous; if in the third, indiscreet and foolish.
Thoughts, like water, will stay on course if we make a place for them to go. As you learn to control your thoughts, you can gain courage, conquer fear and have a happy life.
(Whispered to a novice while standing in front of the convent library) Oh! I would have been sorry to have read all those books...If I had read them, I would have broken my head, and I would have wasted precious time that I could have employed very simply in loving God.
People who deliberate fully before they take a step will spend their lives on one leg
When people do not ignore what they should ignore, but ignore what they should not ignore, this is known as ignorance.
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