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Denis Diderot Quotes - Page 8

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They mistake the first manifestations of a developing sexual nature for the voice of God calling them to Himself; and it is precisely when nature is inciting them that they embrace a fashion of life contrary to nature's

They mistake the first manifestations of a developing sexual nature for the voice of God calling them to Himself; and it is precisely when nature is inciting them that they embrace a fashion of life contrary to nature's wish.

Denis Diderot
Fashion, Mistake, Voice

En ge ne ral, plus un peuple est civilise , poli, moins ses moeurs sont poe tiques; tout s'affaiblit en s'adoucissant. Ingeneral, themore civilized and refinedthepeople, the less poetic are its morals; everything weakens as it mellows.

Denis Diderot
Moral, Poetic, Plus

Are we not madder than those first inhabitants of the plain of Sennar? We know that the distance separating the earth from the sky is infinite, and yet we do not stop building our tower.

Denis Diderot
Distance, Sky, Towers
John Hope Mason, Denis Diderot (1982). “The irresistible Diderot”

There are cats and cats.

Denis Diderot
Cat

If the weather is too cold or rainy, I take shelter in the Regence Cafe, where I entertain myself by watching chess being played. Paris is the world center, and this cafe is the Paris centre for the finest skill at this game.

Denis Diderot
Learning, Games, Skills
Denis Diderot, Jacques Barzun, Ralph Henry Bowen (2001). “Rameau's Nephew and Other Works”, p.8, Hackett Publishing

Il ne faut point donner d'esprit a' ses personnages; mais savoir les placer dans des circonstances qui leur en donnent. You should not give wit to your characters, but know instead how to put them in situations which will make them witty.

Denis Diderot
Witty, Character, Giving

The fact is that she was terribly undressed and I was extremely undressed too. The fact is that I still had my hand where she didn't have anything and she had hers where the same wasn't quite true of me. The fact is that I found myself underneath her and consequently she found herself on top of me.

Denis Diderot
Hands, Facts, Found

The first promise exchanged by two beings of flesh was at the foot of a rock that was crumbling into dust; they took as witness for their constancy a sky that is not the same for a single instant; everything changed in them and around them, and they believed their hearts free of vicissitudes. O children! always children!

Denis Diderot
Love, Change, Time
"Jacques the Fatalist". Book by Denis Diderot, 1796.

This root [the potato], no matter how much you prepare it, is tasteless and floury. It cannot pass for an agreeable food, but it supplies a food sufficiently abundant and sufficiently healthy for men who ask only to sustain themselves. The potato is criticized with reason for being windy, but what matters windiness for the vigorous organisms of peasants and laborers?

Denis Diderot
Men, Vegetables, Roots

If ever anybody dedicated his whole life to the "enthusiasm for truth and justice" using this phrase in the good sense it was Diderot.

Denis Diderot
Justice, Phrases, Enthusiasm
Denis Diderot (1963). “Diderot, interpreter of nature: selected writings”

All abstract sciences are nothing but the study of relations between signs.

Denis Diderot
Science, Technology, Study
"D'Alembert's Dream". Book by Denis Diderot, 1830.

The following general definition of an animal: a system of different organic molecules that have combined with one another, under the impulsion of a sensation similar to an obtuse and muffled sense of touch given to them by the creator of matter as a whole, until each one of them has found the most suitable position for its shape and comfort.

Denis Diderot
Animal, Matter, Comfort
Denis Diderot (1966). “Selected Writings”, New York : Macmillan

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