Denis Diderot

Only the bad man is alone.

— Denis Diderot

My ideas are my whores.

— Denis Diderot

Scepticism is the first step toward truth.

— Denis Diderot

Distance is a great promoter of admiration

— Denis Diderot

For me, my thoughts are my prostitutes.

— Denis Diderot

“Mis ideas son mis rameras”

— Denis Diderot

There is no moral precept that does not have something inconvenient about it.

— Denis Diderot

Good music is very close to primitive language.

— Denis Diderot

“One swallows the lie that flatters, but sips the bitter truth drop by drop.”

— Denis Diderot

His hands would plait the priest's guts, if he had no rope, to strangle kings.

— Denis Diderot

“It is better to reveal a weakness than allow oneself be suspected of a vice.”

— Denis Diderot

“(...) a ja nie lubię kłamstwa, chyba że jest użyteczne i nieodzowne.”

— Denis Diderot

If you disturb the colors of the rainbow, the rainbow is no longer beautiful.

— Denis Diderot

No man has received from nature the right to command his fellow human beings.

— Denis Diderot

Men will never be free until the last king is strangled with the entrails of the last priest

— Denis Diderot

If there are one hundred thousand damned souls for one saved soul, the devil has always the advantage without having given up…

— Denis Diderot

The philosopher has never killed any priests, whereas the priest has killed a great many philosophers.

— Denis Diderot

What has not been examined impartially has not been well examined. Skepticism is therefore the first step towards truth.

— Denis Diderot

“The best order of things, as I see it, is the one that includes me; to hell with the most perfect of…

— Denis Diderot

At an early age I sucked up the milk of Homer, Virgil, Horace, Terence, Anacreon, Plato and Euripides, diluted with that of…

— Denis Diderot

There is less harm to be suffered in being mad among madmen than in being sane all by oneself.

— Denis Diderot

The pit of a theatre is the one place where the tears of virtuous and wicked men alike are mingled.

— Denis Diderot

When shall we see poets born? After a time of disasters and great misfortunes, when harrowed nations begin to breathe again. And…

— Denis Diderot

But if you will recall the history of our civil troubles, you will see half the nation bathe itself, out of piety,…

— Denis Diderot

Those authors into whose hands nature has placed a magic wand, with which they no sooner touch us than we forget the…

— Denis Diderot

How old the world is! I walk between two eternities… What is my fleeting existence in comparison with that decaying rock, that…

— Denis Diderot

En ge ne ral, plus un peuple est civilise , poli, moins ses moeurs sont poe tiques; tout s'affaiblit en s'adoucissant. Ingeneral,…

— Denis Diderot

Our observation of nature must be diligent, our reflection profound, and our experiments exact. We rarely see these three means combined; and…

— Denis Diderot

Wandering in a vast forest at night, I have only a faint light to guide me. A stranger appears and says to…

— Denis Diderot

A thing is not proved just because no one has ever questioned it. What has never been gone into impartially has never…

— Denis Diderot

I am more affected by the attractions of virtue than by the deformities of vice; I turn gently away from the wicked…

— Denis Diderot

This root [the potato], no matter how much you prepare it, is tasteless and floury. It cannot pass for an agreeable food,…

— Denis Diderot

It seems to me that if one had kept silence up to now regarding religion, people would still be submerged in the…

— Denis Diderot

You live as if you were destined to live forever, no thought of your frailty ever enters your head, of how much…

— Denis Diderot

The best mannered people make the most absurd lovers.

— Denis Diderot

My friend, you should blow out your candle in order to find your way more clearly.

— Denis Diderot

To prove the Gospels by a miracle is to prove an absurdity by something contrary to nature.

— Denis Diderot

One may demand of me that I should seek truth, but not that I should find it

— Denis Diderot

When we know to read our own hearts, we acquire wisdom of the heartsof others.

— Denis Diderot

Happiest are the people who give most happiness to others

— Denis Diderot