Montesquieu Quotes

128 Sourced Quotes

And yet there is nothing so badly imagined: nature seems to have provided, that the follies of men should be transient, but they by writing books render them permanent. A fool ought to content himself with having wearied those who lived with him: but he is for tormenting future generations; he is desirous that his folly should triumph over oblivion, which he ought to have enjoyed as well as his grave; he is desirous that posterity should be informed that he lived, and that it should be known for ever that he was a fool.

Montesquieu

Knowledge humanizes mankind, and reason inclines to mildness; but prejudices eradicate every tender disposition.

Montesquieu

Thou knowest that ever since the invention of gunpowder…I continually tremble lest men should, in the end, uncover some secret which would provide a short way of abolishing mankind, of annihilating peoples and nations in their entirety.

Montesquieu

Montesquieu

Montesquieu

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Born: January 18, 1689

Died: February 10, 1755 (aged 66)

Bio: Charles-Louis de Secondat, Baron de La Brède et de Montesquieu, generally referred to as simply Montesquieu, was a French lawyer, man of letters, and political philosopher who lived during the Age of Enlightenment.

Known for:

The Spirit of the Laws (1748)
Persian Letters (1721)
Selected Political Writings
The political theory of Montesquieu

Most used words:

laws, man, power, liberty, nature, people, human, religion, government, spirit, order, reason, life, three, fool

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