Top 15 Louis Antoine de Saint-Just Quotes

Philosopher, military and political leader (1767-1794)

Antoine Louis Léon de Richebourg de Saint-Just (25 August 1767 – 28 July 1794) was a military and political leader during the French Revolution. The youngest of the deputies elected to the National Convention in 1792, Saint-Just rose quickly in their ranks and became a major leader of the government of the French First Republic. He spearheaded the movement to execute King Louis XVI and later drafted the radical French Constitution of 1793. He became a close friend of Maximilien Robespierre, and served with him as one of the commissioners of the powerful Committee of Public Safety.

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Native Name: Louis Antoine Saint-Just

Alternative Names: Louis Florelle de Saint-Just

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Je ne suis d'aucune faction, je les combattrai toutes.

I am not of any faction, I will fight them all.

It is not enough, citizens, to have destroyed the factions, it is necessary now to repair the evil that they have done to the country.

Let Revolutionists be Romans, not Tatars.

Sur le mode d'exécution du décret contre les ennemis de la Révolution, speech to the National Convention (March 3, 1794).

Le bonheur est une idée neuve en Europe.

Happiness is a new idea in Europe.

Osez! — ce mot renferme toute la politique de notre révolution.

Dare! — this word contains all the politics of our revolution.

Citizens, by what illusion could one persuade himself that you are inhuman. Your Revolutionary Tribunal has condemned three hundred rascals to death in a year. Has not the Spanish Inquisition done worse than that ... Have the English assizes butchered no one in that period? ... What of the kings of Europe, does anyone prate to them of pity? Ah, do not allow yourselves to grow soft-hearted!

In every Revolution a dictator is needed to save the state by force, or censors to save it by virtue.

The French people recognize the Supreme Being and the immortality of the soul. The first day of every month is to be dedicated to the eternal.

When human statecraft attaches a chain to the feet of a free man, whom it makes a slave in contempt of nature and citizenship, eternal justice rivets the other end about the tyrant's neck.

What produces the general good is always terrible or seems bizarre when begun too soon ... The Revolution must stop itself at the perfection of public happiness and liberty through the laws.

The Revolution is frozen; all its principles are weakened; there remains only red caps worn by intriguers. The exercise of terror has made crime blasé, as strong liquors made the palace blasé.