Nature Quotes by Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Nature wants children to be children before men... Childhood has its own seeing, thinking and feeling.

— Jean-Jacques Rousseau

For it is in our nature to endure patiently the decrees of fate, but not the ill-will of others.

— Jean-Jacques Rousseau

No man has any natural authority over his fellow men.

— Jean-Jacques Rousseau

It is in man's heart that the life of nature's spectacle exists; to see it, one must feel it.

— Jean-Jacques Rousseau

However great a man's natural talent may be, the act of writing cannot be learned all at once.

— Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Nature never deceives us; it is we who deceive ourselves.

— Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Nature never deceives us; it is always we who deceive ourselves

— Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Whatever may be our natural talents, the art of writing is not acquired all at once.

— Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Supreme happiness consists in self-content; that we may gain this self-content, we are placed upon this earth and endowed with freedom.

— Jean-Jacques Rousseau

“It is pity in which the state of nature takes the place of laws, morals and virtues, with the added advantage that…

— Jean-Jacques Rousseau

People in their natural state are basically good. But this natural innocence,however, is corrupted by the evils of society.

— Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Beware of listening to this impostor; you are undone if you once forget that the fruits of the earth belong to us…

— Jean-Jacques Rousseau

I have resolved on an enterprise that has no precedent and will have no imitator. I want to set before my fellow…

— Jean-Jacques Rousseau

It is manifestly contrary to the law of nature, however defined, that a handful of people should gorge themselves with superfluities while…

— Jean-Jacques Rousseau

A paralyzed man who wants to walk OR an agile man who does not want to walk will both remain neutral in…

— Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Every blue-stocking will remain a spinster as long as there are sensible men on the earth. [Fr., Toute fille lettree restera fille…

— Jean-Jacques Rousseau

At first we will only skim the surface of the earth like young starlings, but soon, emboldened by practice and experience, we…

— Jean-Jacques Rousseau

“...an animal, at the end of a few months, is what it will be all its life; and its species, at the…

— Jean-Jacques Rousseau

To renounce liberty is to renounce being a man, to surrender the rights of humanity and even its duties. For he who…

— Jean-Jacques Rousseau

“I had brought from Paris the national prejudice against Italian music; but I had also received from nature that acute sensibility against…

— Jean-Jacques Rousseau

The social pact, far from destroying natural equality, substitutes, on the contrary, a moral and lawful equality for whatever physical inequality that…

— Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Teach your scholar to observe the phenomena of nature; you will soon rouse his curiosity, but if you would have it grow,…

— Jean-Jacques Rousseau

“The first man who, having enclosed a piece of ground, bethought himself of saying This is mine , and found people simple…

— Jean-Jacques Rousseau

“God (Nature, in my view) makes all things good; man meddles with them and they become evil. He fores one soil to…

— Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Conscience is the voice of the soul, the passions are the voice of the body. Is it astonishing that often these two…

— Jean-Jacques Rousseau

“So long as one remains in the same condition, the inclinations which result from habit and are the least natural to us…

— Jean-Jacques Rousseau

“He who would preserve the supremacy of natural feelings in social life knows not what he asks. Ever at war with himself,…

— Jean-Jacques Rousseau

I was not much afraid of punishment, I was only afraid of disgrace.But that I feared more than death, more than crime,…

— Jean-Jacques Rousseau

“We are born sensitive and from our birth onwards we are affected in various ways by our environment. As soon as we…

— Jean-Jacques Rousseau

“others, without further ceremony ascribing to the strongest an authority over the weakest, have immediately struck out government, without thinking of the…

— Jean-Jacques Rousseau

“Such is the pure movement of nature prior to all reflection. Such is the force of natural pity, which the most depraved…

— Jean-Jacques Rousseau

“The extreme inequality of our ways of life, the excess of idleness among some and the excess of toil among others, the…

— Jean-Jacques Rousseau

“Hold childhood in reverence, and do not be in any hurry to judge it for good or ill. Leave exceptional cases to…

— Jean-Jacques Rousseau

“O man, whatever country you may belong to, whatever your opinions may be, attend to my words; you shall hear your history…

— Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Everything made by man may be destroyed by man; there are no ineffaceable characters except those engraved by nature; and nature makes…

— Jean-Jacques Rousseau

“The earth would be covered with men amongst whom there world would be almost no communication; we would make contact at some…

— Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Our passions are the chief means of self-preservation; to try to destroy them is therefore as absurd as it is useless; this…

— Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Everything is in constant flux on this earth. Nothing keeps the same unchanging shape, and our affections, being attached to things outside…

— Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Education is either from nature, from man or from things. The developing of our faculties and organs is the education of nature;…

— Jean-Jacques Rousseau

“Those whom nature destined to make her disciples have no need of teachers. Bacon , Descartes , Newton — these tutors of…

— Jean-Jacques Rousseau