Which is the greater merit, to enlighten the human race, which remains forever, or to save one's fatherland, which is perishable?

I have only a small flickering light to guide me in the darkness of a thick forest. Up comes a theologian and blows it out.

There is only one virtue, justice; only one duty, to be happy; only one corollary, not to overvalue life and not to fear death.

All things must be examined, debated, investigated without exception and without regard for anyone's feelings... We must run roughshod over all these ancient puerilities, overturn the barriers that reason never erected, give back to the arts and sciences the liberty that is so precious to them.

If you want me to believe in God, you must make me touch him.

I am wholly yours - you are everything to me; we will sustain each other in all the ills of life it may please fate to inflict upon us; you will soothe my troubles; I will comfort you in yours.

There's a bit of testicle at the bottom of our most sublime feelings and our purest tenderness.