When morals are sufficient, law is unnecessary; when morals are insufficient, law is unenforceable.

The man whose whole activity is diverted to inner meditation becomes insensible to all his surroundings.

Each victim of suicide gives his act a personal stamp which expresses his temperament, the special conditions in which he is involved, and which, consequently, cannot be explained by the social and general causes of the phenomenon.

Religious representations are collective representations which express collective realities.

Even one well-made observation will be enough in many cases, just as one well-constructed experiment often suffices for the establishment of a law.

To pursue a goal which is by definition unattainable is to condemn oneself to a state of perpetual unhappiness.

At this point, an urgent question arises: [...] Is it our duty to seek to become a thorough and complete human being, one quite sufficient unto himself; or, on the contrary, to be only a part of a whole, the organ of an organism? Briefly, is the division of labor, at the same time that it is a law of nature, also a moral rule of human conduct; and, if it has this latter character, why and in what degree?