Properly speaking, history is nothing but the crimes and misfortunes of the human race.
Pierre BayleThere is not less wit nor invention in applying rightly a thought one finds in a book, than in being the first author of that thought. Cardinal du Perron has been heard to say that the happy application of a verse of Virgil has deserved a talent.
Pierre BayleCompulsion in the literal Sense is maliciously misrepresented, by supposing it authorizes Violences committed against the Truth. The Answer to this; by which it is prov'd, that the literal Sense does in reality authorize the stirring up Persecutions against the Cause of Truth, and that an erroneous Conscience has the same Rights as an enlighten'd Conscience.
Pierre BayleIt is pure illusion to think that an opinion which passes down from century to century, from generation to generation, may not be entirely false.
Pierre Bayle