Of all the human sciences, the science of man is the most worthy.
Each man must invent his own path.
Existence precedes essence.
With most people the heart grows old with the body.
I was allowed free run of the library and I stormed human wisdom.
Philosophy aims at the logical clarification of thoughts. Philosophy is not a body of doctrine but an activity.
There is only one vice of which no-one boasts - ingratitude.
Illusions fall away, like the peels of a fruit, one after another, and the fruit is experience.
War is sweet to those who have no experience of it, but the experienced man trembles exceedingly at heart on its approach.
A theory which is not refutable by any conceivable event is non-scientific. Irrefutability is not a virtue of a theory (as people often think) but a vice.
Brevity is the soul of wit.
Love is only known by him who hopelessly persists in love.
In this world there are only two tragedies. One is not getting what one wants, and the other is getting it.
But who will guard the guardians?
Article XVI – Any society in which the guarantee of rights is not assured, nor the separation of powers determined, has no Constitution.
Article XV – The society has the right of requesting account from any public agent of its administration.
Article XIV – Each citizen has the right to ascertain, by himself or through his representatives, the need for a public tax, to consent to it freely, to know the uses to which it is put, and of determining the proportion, basis, collection, and duration.
Article XIII – For the maintenance of the public force and for the expenditures of administration, a common contribution is indispensable; it must be equally distributed between all the citizens, according to their ability to pay.
Article XII – The guarantee of the rights of man and of the citizen necessitates a public force: this force is thus instituted for the advantage of all and not for the particular utility of those in whom it is trusted.
Article XI – The free communication of thoughts and of opinions is one of the most precious rights of man: any citizen thus may speak, write, print freely, except to respond to the abuse of this liberty, in the cases determined by the law.
Article X – No one may be disturbed for his opinions, even religious ones, provided that their manifestation does not trouble the public order established by the law.
Article IX – Any man being presumed innocent until he is declared culpable, if it is judged indispensable to arrest him, any rigor which would not be necessary for the securing of his person must be severely reprimanded by the law.
Article VIII – The law should establish only penalties that are strictly and evidently necessary, and no one can be punished but under a law established and promulgated before the offense and legally applied.
Article VII – No man can be accused, arrested nor detained but in the cases determined by the law, and according to the forms which it has prescribed. Those who solicit, dispatch, carry out or cause to be carried out arbitrary orders, must be punished; but any citizen called or seized under the terms of the law must obey at once; he renders himself culpable by resistance.
Article VI – The law is the expression of the general will. All the citizens have the right of contributing personally or through their representatives to its formation. It must be the same for all, either that it protects, or that it punishes. All the citizens, being equal in its eyes, are equally admissible to all public dignities, places and employments, according to their capacity and without distinction other than that of their virtues and of their talents.
Article V – The law has the right to forbid only actions harmful to society. Anything which is not forbidden by the law cannot be impeded, and no one can be constrained to do what it does not order.
Article III – The principle of any sovereignty resides essentially in the Nation. No body, no individual can exert authority which does not emanate expressly from it.
Article II – The goal of any political association is the conservation of the natural and imprescriptible rights of man. These rights are liberty, property, safety and resistance against oppression.
I revolt, therefore I am.
Even a single hair casts a shadow.
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