Quotes about Society

Teach those who are ignorant as many things as possible; society is culpable, in that it does not afford instruction gratis; it is responsible for the night which it produces If the soul is left in darkness, sins will be committed. The guilty one is not he who commits the sin, but he who causes the darkness.

Or, donner la grosse cloche en mariage à Quasimodo, c'était donner Juliette à Roméo.

And that is how a self-seeking hotchpotch distorts and debases the very finest social schemes. It is the black vein in white marble; it gets everywhere, appears under your chisel at any moment without warning. Your statue has to be redone.

All civilisation begins with a theocracy and ends with a democracy. This law of liberty succeeding unity is written in architecture.

The attempt has been made, and wrongly, to make a class of the bourgeoisie. The bourgeoisie is simply the contented portion of the people. The bourgeois is the man who now has time to sit down. A chair is not a caste.

The history of men is reflected in the history of sewers.

For our part, if we were forced to make a choice between the barbarians of civilization and the civilized men of barbarism, we should choose the barbarians.

Common right is nought but the protection of all radiating over the right of each. This protection of all is termed Fraternity. The point of intersection of all these aggregated sovereignties is called Society. This intersection being a junction, this point is a knot. Hence comes what is called the social tie.

Equality, citizens, is not the whole of society on a level, a society of tall blades of grass and small oaks, or a number of entangled jealousies. It is, legally speaking, every aptitude having the same opportunity for a career; politically all consciences having the same right. Equality has an organ, gratuitous and compulsory education. We must begin with the right to the alphabet.

True, I tore the drapery from the altar; but it was to dress the wounds of the country.

He visited the poor so long as he had any money; when he no longer had any, he visited the rich.

Yes, the brutalities of progress are called revolutions. When they are over, this is recognized: that the human race has been harshly treated, but that it has advanced.