Denis Diderot Quotes

Let tyrants shake their iron rod.

The first revolt is against the supreme tyranny of theology, of the phantom of God. As long as we have a master in heaven, we will be slaves on earth.

I would not like a king who could obey.

Better a hundred years of tyranny than one day of anarchy.

Systematic recourse to violence put forward as the necessary path to liberation has to be condemned as a destructive illusion and one that opens the way to new forms of servitude. One must condemn with equal vigor violence exercised by the powerful against the poor, arbitrary action by the police, and any form of violence established as a system of government.

Let us strangle the last king with the guts of the last priest.

No one can go on being a rebel too long without becoming an autocrat.

Make men large and strong and tyranny will bankrupt itself in making shackles for them.

Every revolution, bloody or not, has two phases. The first phase is defined by the struggle for freedom, the second by the struggle for power and revenge on the votaries of the ancien regime.

Everywhere that freedom stirs, let tyrants fear.

Dictators and oppressors should continue to fear me because I will be here for a long time.

Every successful revolution puts on in time the robes of the tyrant it has deposed.

There is no stopping the world's tendency to throw off imposed restraints, the religious authority that is based on the ignorance of the many, the political authority that is based on the knowledge of the few.

I fear that, tired of anarchy, you may hope at the end for a return of oppression and that you may welcome the yoke of the first fortunate adventurer who shows up, who, far from consolidating your destiny, will only prolong your servitude

Freedom is a dangerous intoxicant and very few people can tolerate it in any quantity; it brings out the old raiding, oppressing, murderous instincts; the rage for revenge, for power, the lust for bloodshed. The longing for freedom takes the form of crushing the enemy — there is always the enemy! — into the earth; and where and who is the enemy if there is no visible establishment to attack, to destroy with blood and fire? Remember all that oratory when freedom is threatened again. Freedom, remember, is not the same as liberty.

What has commonly been called rebellion has more often been nothing but a glorious struggle in opposition to the lawless power of rebellious kings and princes

Dictators are as scared of books as they are of cannon.

Better 100 years of tyranny than one day of anarchy.

The Church is the handmaid of tyranny and the steady enemy of liberty.

France seems travailing in the birth of freedom. Her throes and pangs of labor are violent…. Royalty, nobility, and vile pageantry by which a few of the human race lord it over and tread on the necks of the their fellow mortals, seem like to be demolished …. Ye Gods, with what indignation do I review the late attempt of some creatures among us to revive the vile machinery. Oh Adams, Adams what a wretch thou art!

All power, all subordination to authority rests on the executioner …. Remove this incomprehensible agent from the world and at that very moment order gives way to chaos, thrones topple and society disappears.

Every censorship, however good its intent, degenerates inevitably into tyranny.

The government in a revolution is the despotism of liberty against tyranny.

Tyranny cannot defeat the power of ideas.

The last king should be strangled with the entrails of the last priest.