Of all the varieties of virtues, liberalism is the most beloved.

Absence and death are the same – only that in death there is no suffering.

Good people do not need laws to tell them to act responsibly, while bad people will find a way around the laws.

I have lived eighty years of life and know nothing for it, but to be resigned and tell myself that flies are born to be eaten by spiders and man to be devoured by sorrow.

Know then thyself, presume not God to scan; The proper study of mankind is man.

One that confounds good and evil is an enemy to good.

Socialism is a philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance, and the gospel of envy, its inherent virtue is the equal sharing of misery.

It is better to do one’s own duty, however defective it may be, than to follow the duty of another, however well one may perform it. He who does his duty as his own nature reveals it, never sins.

Which death is preferably to every other? ‚The unexpected‘.

It is better to take what does not belong to you than to let it lie around neglected.

By indignities men come to dignities.

Regardless of what society says, we can’t go on much longer in the sea of immorality without judgment coming.

Don’t part with your illusions. When they are gone, you may still exist, but you have ceased to live.

There is not a more unhappy being than a superannuated idol.

If you can be well without health, you may be happy without virtue.

Paradise was made for tender hearts; hell, for loveless hearts.

It’s not morbid to talk about death. Most people don’t worry about death, they worry about a bad death.

Beyond a doubt truth bears the same relation to falsehood as light to darkness.

Nothing can cure the soul but the senses, just as nothing can cure the senses but the soul.

Science is nothing but perception.

The higher a man stands, the more the word vulgar becomes unintelligible to him.

By the sole fact of his entering into ‚Thought,‘ man represents something entirely singular and absolutely unique in the field of our experience. On a single planet, there could not be more than one centre of emergence for reflexion.

The virtues are lost in self-interest as rivers are lost in the sea.

Risk is a part of God’s game, alike for men and nations.

A man may be a pessimistic determinist before lunch and an optimistic believer in the will’s freedom after it.

I think one’s feelings waste themselves in words; they ought all to be distilled into actions which bring results.

Our object in the construction of the state is the greatest happiness of the whole, and not that of any one class.

All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident.

One must not cheat anyone, not even the world of its victory.

There is no satisfaction in hanging a man who does not object to it.

As we know, while our species remains alive, everybody has the sacred duty to be optimistic. Ethically, any other behaviour wouldn’t be admissible.

All mankind is divided into three classes: those that are immovable, those that are movable, and those that move.

The abdomen is the reason why man does not readily take himself to be a god.

This is my simple religion. There is no need for temples; no need for complicated philosophy. Our own brain, our own heart is our temple; the philosophy is kindness.

None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free.

A man’s as miserable as he thinks he is.

There cannot be a God because if there were one, I could not believe that I was not He.

Virtue consists, not in abstaining from vice, but in not desiring it.

Truth is a good dog; but always beware of barking too close to the heels of an error, lest you get your brains kicked out.

Only a man’s character is the real criterion of worth.

No man ever steps in the same river twice, for it’s not the same river and he’s not the same man.

What difference does it make to the dead, the orphans, and the homeless, whether the mad destruction is wrought under the name of totalitarianism or the holy name of liberty or democracy?

Real living is living for others.

If what you have done is unjust, you have not succeeded.

For me, my secularism is, India first. I say, the philosophy of my party is ‚Justice to all. Appeasement to none.‘ This is our secularism.

It is difficult to free fools from the chains they revere.

Therefore, the good of man must be the end of the science of politics.

A tomb now suffices him for whom the whole world was not sufficient.

To believe in God is impossible not to believe in Him is absurd.

The end of man is action, and not thought, though it be of the noblest.

A good politician is quite as unthinkable as an honest burglar.

I worked in ad sales. I would call up local businesses and try to get them to buy ads in the paper. The whole time, I felt like I was just scamming people.

If you must break the law, do it to seize power: in all other cases observe it.

A man can do what he wants, but not want what he wants.

I just know what is right and I want to do what is right.

A strong argument for the religion of Christ is this – that offences against Charity are about the only ones which men on their death-beds can be made – not to understand – but to feel – as crime.

Think occasionally of the suffering of which you spare yourself the sight.

My philosophy is: It’s none of my business what people say of me and think of me.

What’s the good of drawing in the next breath if all you do is let it out and draw in another?

When a man bleeds inwardly, it is a dangerous thing for himself; but when he laughs inwardly, it bodes no good to other people.

If I shall exist eternally, how shall I exist tomorrow?