Since men cannot create new forces, but merely combine and control those which already exist, the only way in which they can preserve themselves is by uniting their separate powers in a combination strong enough to overcome any resistance, uniting them so that their powers are directed by a single motive and act in concert.
Jean-Jacques RousseauIf there were a people consisting of gods, they would be governed democratically. So perfect a government is not suitable to men.
Jean-Jacques RousseauGeneral abstract truth is the most precious of all blessings; without it, man is blind; it is the eye of reason.
Jean-Jacques RousseauTeach him to live rather than to avoid death: life is not breath, but action, the use of our senses, our mind, our faculties, every part of ourselves which makes us conscious of our being. Life consists less in length of days than in the keen sense of living. A man maybe buried at a hundred and may never have lived at all. He would have fared better had he died young.
Jean-Jacques Rousseau