Belief in a Divine mission is one of the many forms of certainty that have afflicted the human race.

In America everybody is of opinion that he has no social superiors, since all men are equal, but he does not admit that he has no social inferiors.

Envy ... is one form of a vice, partly moral, partly intellectual, which consists in seeing things never in themselves but only in their relations.

Education, which was at first made universal in order that all might be able to read and write, has been found capable of serving quite other purposes. By instilling nonsense it unifies populations and generates collective enthusiasm.

More cranks take up unfashionable errors than unfashionable truths.

Opinions which justify cruelty are inspired by cruel impulses.

Mankind has become so much one family that we cannot insure our own prosperity except by insuring that of everyone else. If you wish to be happy yourself, you must resign yourself to seeing others also happy.

Every advance in civilization has been denounced as unnatural while it was recent.

The more we realize our minuteness and our impotence in the face of cosmic forces, the more

If all our happiness is bound up entirely in our personal circumstances it is difficult not to demand of life more than it has to give.