Top 500 Voltaire Quotes (2026 Update)
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351. “Fanaticism, to which men are so much inclined, has always served not only to render them more brutalized but more wicked.”

— Voltaire

352. “Exaggeration, the inseparable companion of greatness.”

— Voltaire

353. “As you know, the Inquisition is an admirable and wholly Christian invention to make the pope and the monks more powerful and turn a whole kingdom into hypocrites.”

— Voltaire

354. “Let us help one another to bear our burdens.”

— Voltaire

355. “I am a little deaf, a little blind, a little important and on top of this are two or three abominable infirmities, but nothing destroys my hope.”

— Voltaire

356. “The malevolence of men revealed itself to his mind in all of its ugliness.”

— Voltaire

357. “There is an astonishing imagination, even in the science of mathematics.”

— Voltaire

358. “The Pride of every Jew finds cause to believe that the cause of their down fall is not their detestable politics, or ignorance of social graces, but the raft of God. They believe it took a miracle to undo them.”

— Voltaire

359. “Opinion is called the queen of the world; it is so, for when reason opposes it, it is condemned to death. It must rise twenty times from its ashes to gradually drive away the usurper.”

— Voltaire

360. “Let us leave every man at liberty to seek into him and to lose himself in his ideas.”

— Voltaire

361. “All that is very well,” answered Candide, “but let us cultivate our garden.”

— Voltaire

362. “Anyone who seeks to destroy the passions instead of controlling them is trying to play the angel.”

— Voltaire

363. “Heaven made virtue; man, the appearance.”

— Voltaire

364. “Not all citizens can be equally strong; but they can all be equally free.”

— Voltaire

Featured in: Strong Quotes

365. “We offer up prayers to god only because we have made him after our own image. We treat him like a pasha, or a sultan, who is capable of being exasperated and appeased.”

— Voltaire

366. “Your destiny is that of a man, your vows those of a god.”

— Voltaire

367. “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.”

— Voltaire

368. “It requires ages to destroy a popular opinion.”

— Voltaire

369. “I read these words which are the sum of all moral philosophy, and which cut short all the disputes of the casuists: When in doubt if an action is good or bad, refrain.”

— Voltaire

370. “Men, generally going with the stream, seldom judge for themselves, and purity of taste is almost as rare as talent.”

— Voltaire

371. “Happiness is not the portion of man.”

— Voltaire

372. “Of all religions, Christianity is without a doubt the one that should inspire tolerance most.”

— Voltaire

373. “I should like to lie at your feet and die in your arms.”

— Voltaire

374. “What is faith? Is it to believe that which is evident? No. It is perfectly evident to my mind that there exists a necessary, eternal, supreme, and intelligent being. This is no matter of faith, but of reason.”

— Voltaire

375. “A woman can keep one secret the secret of her age.”

— Voltaire

376. “A torch lighted in the forests of America set all Europe in conflagration.”

— Voltaire

377. “The ancient Romans built their greatest masterpieces of architecture, their amphitheaters, for wild beasts to fight in.”

— Voltaire

378. “He was a great patriot, a humanitarian, a loyal friend; provided, of course, he really is dead.”

— Voltaire

379. “Nothing can be more contrary to religion and the clergy than reason and common sense.”

— Voltaire

380. “Slavery is also as ancient as war, and war as human nature.”

— Voltaire

381. “If there had been a censorship of the press in Rome we should have had today neither Horace nor Juvenal, nor the philosophical writings of Cicero.”

— Voltaire

382. “In general, the art of government consists of taking as much money as possible from one class of citizens to give to another.”

— Voltaire

383. “Mortals are equal; their mask differs.”

— Voltaire

384. “Theological religion is the source of all imaginable follies and disturbances. It is the parent of fanaticism and civil discord; it is the enemy of mankind.”

— Voltaire

385. “He who is involved in ecstasies and visions, who takes dreams for reality, and his own imagination for prophesy, is a fanatical novice of great hope and promise, and will soon advance to the higher stage and kill men for the love of God.”

— Voltaire

386. “Chess is a game which reflects most honor on human wit.”

— Voltaire

387. “Once your faith persuades you to believe what your intelligence declares absurd, beware, lest you likewise sacrifice your reason in the conduct of your life.”

— Voltaire

388. “Independence in the end is the fruit of injustice.”

— Voltaire

389. “Four thousand volumes of metaphysics will not teach us what the soul is.”

— Voltaire

390. “Every sensible man, every honorable man, must hold the Christian sect in horror.”

— Voltaire

391. “Thought depends absolutely on the stomach, but in spite of that, those who have the best stomachs are not the best thinkers.”

— Voltaire

392. “When his highness sends a ship to Egypt, does he trouble his head whether the mice on board are at their ease or not?”

— Voltaire

393. “I serve your Beaune to my friends, but your Volnay I keep for myself.”

— Voltaire

394. “I advise you to go on living solely to enrage those who are paying your annuities. It is the only pleasure I have left.”

— Voltaire

395. “When he who hears does not know what he who speaks means, and when he who speaks does not know what he himself means, that is philosophy.”

— Voltaire

396. “There are men who can think no deeper than a fact.”

— Voltaire

397. “The question of good and evil remains in irremediable chaos for those who seek to fathom it in reality. It is mere mental sport to the disputants, who are captives that play with their chains.”

— Voltaire

398. “He shines in the second rank, who is eclipsed in the first.”

— Voltaire

Featured in: Firsts Quotes

399. “When a man is in love, jealous, and just whipped by the Inquisition, he is no longer himself.”

— Voltaire

400. “Our priests are not what a silly populace supposes; all their learning consists in our credulity.”

— Voltaire