Joseph Joubert Quotes

It is not simply a matter of distinguishing between good and evil, but also of not confusing what is laughable with what is not. To make laughable what is not is in some way to make bad what was good.

A thought is a thing as real as a cannonball.

Glory. Lovelier to desire than to possess.

Man loves what is small; and he loves what is big, through the same weakness.

They want to shake up the world, not make it wiser.

The staircase that leads to God. What does it matter if it is make-believe, if we really climb it? What difference does it make who builds it, or if it is made of marble or word, of brick, stone, or mud? The essential thing is that it be solid and that in climbing it we feel the peace that is inaccessible to those who do not climb it.

For in spite of ourselves we respect those whom we see respected.

Here is the desert. In this silence, everything speaks to me: and in your noise, everything falls silent.

Reason does not reason. It goes straight to the fact or the consequence.

To seek the truth. But, as you are seeking and as you are waiting, what will you do, what will you think, what will you practice, what rules will you follow?

There are words agreeable to the eye (in the same way there are words agreeable to the ear). By a fortunate combination of the letters that form them or by the harmony of these letters. For each letter has its shape.

Never cut what you can untie

The imagination is an eye where images remain forever.

In these times when, to express ourselves, we must speak in a way others do not.

Solitude gives an I. I that gives solitude. It is in our thoughts, and the one the world gives, in our feelings. Because solitude grows accustomed to seeing, to contemplating; and the world, to acting for itself.