famous quotes

Famous quotes: the most famous formulas, thoughts and phrases

Great historical phrases and words , well-known formulas and thoughts, the best famous quotes deserve more as a landmark than a name and a date.

Our daily conversations are stuffed with these little ready-made formulas that are as effective as they are imperishable. Like the chorus of a song that we hum without remembering its performer, and taken up by the greatest number, we often do not know the identity of the author or the context.

However, some famous quotes are everyday expressions because they stand on their own and don't need historical context or reference to take them into account. On a daily basis, we do not seek to know the origin of the good words that we pronounce.

Famous quotes and small imperishable formulas

• Man is a wolf to man

Man is a wolf to man is a very well-known quote by Plautus from Asinaria, II, 4, 495 by Plautus.

The first occurrence of this phrase is in Plautus, in his comedy Asinaria (The Comedy of Donkeys, around 195 BC, II v495: "Lupus est homo homini, non homo, quom qualis sit non novit" "When one does not know him, man is a wolf to man”). In this initial formula, it means that the man takes the man he does not know for a wolf. Plautus targets the fear of the unknown and not the violence of humans or Man is a wolf to man, not a man, when we do not know he is.

This quote is often attributed to Thomas Hobbes. In the state of nature, man is a wolf to man. In the social state, man is a god for man.

• It has done me too much good to say any harm. He hurt me too much to say good

Pierre Corneille.

Extract from Poésies divers (Written, in 1642, on Richelieu, on the occasion of his death.) by Corneille.

Whether one speaks badly or well of the famous cardinal, my prose nor my verses will never say anything about it. He has done me too much good to say any harm, he has done me too much harm to say any good.

• Nothing great has been accomplished in the world without passion

George Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel.

Nothing great has been accomplished in the world without passion is a quote from Hegel from the introduction to the philosophy of history.

The reason in the story: Here and there, men defend their particular goals against the general law, they act freely. But what constitutes the general foundation, the substantial element, the right is not disturbed by it. The same goes for the order of the world. Its elements are on the one hand the passions, on the other Reason. The passions constitute the active element. They are not always opposed to the ethical order; on the contrary, they realize the Universal.

As regards the morality of the passions, it is evident that they aspire only to their own interest. On this side, they appear as selfish and evil. But what is active is always individual: in action I am myself, it is my own goal that I seek to accomplish. But this goal can be good, and even universal. The interest may be quite particular, but it does not follow that it is opposed to the Universal. The Universal must be realized through the particular. We therefore say that nothing was done without being supported by the interest of those who collaborated in it.

This interest, we call it passion when repressing all other interests or goals, the whole individuality projects itself on an objective with all the interior fibers of its will and concentrates its forces and all its needs in this goal. In this sense, we must say that nothing great has been accomplished in the world without passion.

• We are not serious, when we are seventeen

Arthur Rimbaud

We are not serious, when we are seventeen years old is the first line of a poem by Arthur Rimbaud written in 1870 and entitled Roman. It has been reused by several works:

We are not serious when we are seventeen, double album by Léo Ferré published in 1986.

One is not serious when one is seventeen years old, autobiography of Barbara Samson published in 1994.

When we are seventeen, French film directed by André Téchiné, released in 2016.

• Science without conscience is but ruin of the soul.

François Rabelais

But because, according to the wise Solomon, Wisdom does not enter into a marivolous soul, and knowledge without conscience is only ruin of the soul, it is appropriate for you to serve, love, and fear God by giving him all your thoughts and everything. your hope; and by faith formed of charity, to be joined to him, so as never to be distraught by sin.

But because according to the words of the Sage Solomon, Wisdom does not enter into a malevolent soul, and knowledge without conscience is only ruin of the soul, it is appropriate for you to serve, love and fear God by giving him all your thoughts. and all your hope; and by charitable faith, be faithful to him, so that you never deviate from it by sin.