Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712 – 1778)
Franco-Swiss philosopher of Enlightenment whose political ideas influenced the French Revolution, the development of socialist theory, and the growth of nationalism.
In reality, the difference is, that the savage lives within himself while social man lives outside himself and can only live in the opinion of others, so that he seems to receive the feeling of his own existence only from the judgement of others concerning him. It is not to my present purpose to insist on the indifference to good and evil which arises from this disposition, in spite of our many fine works on morality, or to show how, everything being reduced to appearances, there is but art and mummery in even honour, friendship, virtue, and often vice itself, of which we at length learn the secret of boasting; to show, in short, how abject we are, and never daring to ask ourselves in the midst of so much philosophy, benevolence, politeness, and of such sublime codes of morality, we have nothing to show for ourselves but a frivolous and deceitful appearance, honour without virtue, reason without wisdom, and pleasure without happiness.
The person who is slowest in making a promise is most faithful in its performance.
Insults are the arguments employed by those who are in the wrong.
Women, in general, are not attracted to art at all, nor knowledge, and not at all to genius.
War then, is a relation — not between man and man: but between state and state; and individuals are enemies only accidentally: not as men, nor even as citizens: but as soldiers; not as members of their country, but as its defenders.
To endure is the first thing that a child ought to learn, and that which he will have the most need to know.
...As with any truly great writer, it is foolish to judge Rousseau by the instances where people tried to follow his advice literally, still less by the harmful things done in his name (by which standard Jesus Christ does not exactly come off unblemished.) Rousseau’s influence on modern culture has been far too vast and multifaceted to squeeze into reductive categories of “positive” and “negative” and even his most misguided prescriptions often came accompanied by profound and poetic insights.
All that time is lost which might be better employed.
I prefer liberty with danger than peace with slavery.
Liberty is obedience to the law which one has laid down for oneself.
I shall always maintain that whoso says in his heart, "There is no God," while takes the name of God upon his lips, is either a liar or a madman.
It is not enough to say that Jean-Jacques is close to us; he is one of us. His contemporaries and the generation that followed his have retained his redundancy and his eloquence.
Temperance and labor are the two best physicians of man; labor sharpens the appetite and temperance prevents from indulging to excess.
Truth is no road to fortune.
Hitler is an outcome of Rousseau.
L'homme est né libre, et partout il est dans les fers.
Sophie is not beautiful, but in her company men forget beautiful women, and beautiful women are dissatisfied with themselves.
Force does not constitute right... obedience is due only to legitimate powers.
Men and nations can only be reformed in their youth; they become incorrigible as they grow old.
He who is most slow in making a promise is the most faithful in performance of it. ** Variants: He who is slowest in making a promise is most faithful in its performance.
He who is the most slow in making a promise is the most faithful in the performance of it.