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Quotes of the Day for 21 November 2004 - Voltaire

François Marie Arouet was born at Paris on this day in 1694. He received his education at a Jesuit college there, leaving school at age 16 and soon becoming a favorite among the aristocracy for his wit. Hubris struck, after he wrote a satire of the government he spent almost a year in the Bastille and three years in exile in England. It was in that famous prison that he wrote his first successful play, published under his new "nom de plume" (I normally use the French term, but in this case it's particularly appropriate), Voltaire.

A multitude of laws in a country is like a great number of physicians, a sign of weakness and malady.

Animals have these advantages over man: they never hear the clock strike, they die without any idea of death, they have no theologians to instruct them, their last moments are not disturbed by unwelcome and unpleasant ceremonies, their funerals cost them nothing, and no one starts lawsuits over their wills.
     - letter to Count Schomberg, 31 August 1769

God is a comedian playing to an audience too afraid to laugh.

Judge a man by his questions rather than his answers.

No problem can withstand the assault of sustained thinking.

To succeed in the world it is not enough to be stupid, you must also be well-mannered.
     - François Marie Arouet (Voltaire), 1694 - 1778

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