Terror is only justice: prompt, severe and inflexible. It is then an emanation of virtue.

Is it to be thought unreasonable that the people, in atonement for wrongs of a century, demand the vengeance of a single day?

The secret of freedom lies in educating people, whereas the secret of tyranny is in keeping them ignorant.

The general will rules in society as the private will governs each separate individual.

No one loves armed missionaries; the first lesson of nature and prudence is to repulse them as enemies.

Terror is nothing more than justice, prompt, secure and inflexible.

Peoples do not judge in the same way as courts of law; they do not hand down sentences, they throw thunderbolts; they do not condemn kings, they drop them back into the void; and this justice is worth just as much as that of the courts.