The people who, in order to enjoy the liberty which suites them, resort to the representative system, must exercise an active and constant surveillan…

- Benjamin Constant

There are things one does not say for a long time, but, once they are said, one never stops repeating them.

- Benjamin Constant

Woe to the man who in the first moments of a love-affair does not believe that it will last forever! Woe to him who even in the arms of some mistress…

- Benjamin Constant

There is a bizarre notion according to which it is claimed that because men are corrupt, it is necessary to give certain of them all the more power..…

- Benjamin Constant

Nearly always, so as to live at peace with ourselves, we disguise our own impotence and weakness as calculation and policy; it is our way of placatin…

- Benjamin Constant

Art for art's sake, with no purpose, for any purpose perverts art. But art achieves a purpose which is not its own. (1804)

- Benjamin Constant

Every time government attempts to handle our affairs, it costs more and the results are worse than if we had handled them ourselves.

- Benjamin Constant

No duty, however, binds us to these so-called laws, whose corrupting influence menaces what is noblest in our being.

- Benjamin Constant

The great question in life is the suffering we cause, and the most ingenious metaphysics do not justify the man who has broken the heart that loved h…

- Benjamin Constant