Every artists wants to be applauded

It is hard to prevent oneself from believing what one so keenly desires.

The more humanity owes him, the more society denies him. Every door is shut against him, even when he has a right to its being opened: and if he ever obtains justice, it is with much greater difficulty than others obtain favors.

Behold the works of our philosophers; with all their pompous diction, how mean and contemptible they are by comparison with the Scriptures! Is it possible that a book at once so simple and sublime should be merely the work of man?

The political body, therefore, is also a moral being which has a will; and this general will, which tends always to the conservation and well-being of the whole and of each part of it ... is, for all members of the state ... the rule of what is just or unjust.

The world of reality has its limits; the world of imagination is boundless.

To renounce liberty is to renounce being a man, to surrender the rights of humanity and even its duties. For he who renounces everything no indemnity is possible. Such a renunciation is incompatible with man's nature; to remove all liberty from his will is to remove all morality from his acts.