Jean-Jacques Rousseau was a Genevan philosopher, writer and composer. His political philosophy influenced the progress of the Enlightenment throughout Europe, as well as aspects of the French Revolution and the development of modern political, economic and educational thought. Profoundly inspirational Jean Jacques Rousseau quotes will challenge the way you think and help you live a meaningful life.
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Famous Jean Jacques Rousseau Quotes
Patience is bitter, but its fruit is sweet. Jean Jacques Rousseau
There are always four sides to a story your side, their side, the truth and what really happened. Jean Jacques Rousseau
No man has any natural authority over his fellow men. Jean Jacques Rousseau
People in their natural state are basically good. But this natural innocence,however, is corrupted by the evils of society. Jean Jacques Rousseau
You forget that the fruits belong to all and that the land belongs to no one. Jean Jacques Rousseau
Freedom is the power to choose our own chains. Jean Jacques Rousseau
The person who has lived the most is not the one with the most years but the one with the richest experiences. Jean Jacques Rousseau
I prefer liberty with danger than peace with slavery. Jean Jacques Rousseau
It is unnatural for a majority to rule, for a majority can seldom be organized and united for specific action, and a minority can. Jean Jacques Rousseau
The visible order of the universe proclaims a supreme intelligence. Jean Jacques Rousseau
O love, if I regret the age when one savors you, it is not for the hour of pleasure, but for the one that follows it. Jean Jacques Rousseau
Insults are the arguments employed by those who are in the wrong. Jean Jacques Rousseau
We should not teach children the sciences; but give them a taste for them. Jean Jacques Rousseau
The freedom of Mankind does not lie in the fact that can do what we want, but that we do not have to do that which we do not want. Jean Jacques Rousseau
The English think they are free. They are free only during the election of members of parliament. Jean Jacques Rousseau
Those people who treat politics and morality separately will never understand either of them. Jean Jacques Rousseau
It is too difficult to think nobly when one thinks only of earning a living. Jean Jacques Rousseau
Why should we build our happiness on the opinons of others, when we can find it in our own hearts? Jean Jacques Rousseau
We are born, so to speak, twice over; born into existence, and born into life; born a human being, and born a man. Jean Jacques Rousseau
The money you have gives you freedom; the money you pursue enslaves you. Jean Jacques Rousseau
Ordinary readers, forgive my paradoxes one must make them when one reflects; and whatever you may say, I prefer being a man with paradoxes than a man with prejudices. Jean Jacques Rousseau
I hate books; they only teach us to talk about things we know nothing about. Jean Jacques Rousseau
Money is the seed of money, and the first guinea is sometimes more difficult to acquire than the second million. Jean Jacques Rousseau
I hate books; they only teach us to talk about things we know nothing about. Jean Jacques Rousseau
The body politic, as well as the human body, begins to die as soon as it is born, and carries itself the causes of its destruction. Jean Jacques Rousseau
The falsification of history has done more to impede human development than any one thing known to mankind. Jean Jacques Rousseau
Virtue is a state of war, and to live in it we have always to combat with ourselves. Jean Jacques Rousseau
Plants are shaped by cultivation and men by education. We are born weak, we need strength; we are born totally unprovided, we need aid; we are born stupid, we need judgment. Everything we do not have at our birth and which we need when we are grown is given us by education. Jean Jacques Rousseau
Heroes are not known by the loftiness of their carriage; the greatest braggarts are generally the merest cowards.Jean Jacques Rousseau
Once you teach people to say what they do not understand, it is easy enough to get them to say anything you like. Jean Jacques Rousseau
All of my misfortunes come from having thought too well of my fellows. Jean Jacques Rousseau
Everything is good as it comes from the hands of the Maker of the world, but degenerates once it gets into the hands of man. Jean Jacques Rousseau
I long remained a child, and I am still one in many respects. Jean Jacques Rousseau
Those that are most slow in making a promise are the most faithful in the performance of it. Jean Jacques Rousseau
Force does not constitute right obedience is due only to legitimate powers. Jean Jacques Rousseau
Civilization is a hopeless race to discover remedies for the evils it produces. Jean Jacques Rousseau
Insults are the arguments employed by those who are in the wrong. Jean Jacques Rousseau
I have never believed that man’s freedom consisted in doing what he wants, but rather in never doing what he does not want to do. Jean Jacques Rousseau
The world of reality has its limits; the world of imagination is boundless. Jean Jacques Rousseau
The greatest braggarts are usually the biggest cowards. Jean Jacques Rousseau
Happiness a good bank account, a good cook, and a good digestion. Jean Jacques Rousseau
It is easier to conquer than to administer. With enough leverage, a finger could overturn the world; but to support the world, one must have the shoulders of Hercules. Jean Jacques Rousseau
I may be no better, but at least I am different. Jean Jacques Rousseau
Gratitude is a duty which ought to be paid, but which none have a right to expect. Jean Jacques Rousseau
It is easier to conquer than to administer. With enough leverage, a finger could overturn the world; but to support the world, one must have the shoulders of Hercules. Jean Jacques Rousseau
Falsehood has an infinity of combinations, but truth has only one mode of being. Jean Jacques Rousseau
Do you not know that a child badly taught is farther from being wise than one not taught at all? Jean Jacques Rousseau
Whoever blushes is already guilty; true innocence is ashamed of nothing. Jean Jacques Rousseau
Socrates dies with honor, surrounded by his disciples listening to the most tender words the easiest death that one could wish to die. Jesus dies in pain, dishonor, mockery, the object of universal cursing the most horrible death that one could fear. At the receipt of the cup of poison, Socrates blesses him who could not give it to him without tears; Jesus, while suffering the sharpest pains, prays for His most bitter enemies. If Socrates lived and died like a philosopher, Jesus lived and died like a god. Jean Jacques Rousseau
A feeble body weakens the mind. Jean Jacques Rousseau
The person who has lived the most is not the one with the most years but the one with the richest experiences. Jean Jacques Rousseau
We are born weak, we need strength; helpless, we need aid; foolish, we need reason. All that we lack at birth, all that we need when we come to man’s estate, is the gift of education. Jean Jacques Rousseau
In all the ills that befall us, we are more concerned by the intention than the result. A tile that falls off a roof may injure us more seriously, but it will not wound us so deeply as a stone thrown deliberately by a malevolent hand. The blow may miss, but the intention always strikes home. Jean Jacques Rousseau
Plant and your spouse plants with you; weed and you weed alone. Jean Jacques Rousseau
Teach by doing whenever you can, and only fall back upon words when doing it is out of the question. Jean Jacques Rousseau
The training of children is a profession, where we must know how to waste time in order to save it. Jean Jacques Rousseau
The first person who, having enclosed a plot of land, took it into his head to say this is mine and found people simple enough to believe him was the true founder of civil society. What crimes, wars, murders, what miseries and horrors would the human race have been spared, had some one pulled up the stakes or filled in the ditch and cried out to his fellow men. Do not listen to this imposter. You are lost if you forget that the fruits of the earth belong to all and the earth to no one! Jean Jacques Rousseau
I hate books; they only teach us to talk about things we know nothing about. Jean Jacques Rousseau
To be sane in a world of madman is in itself madness. Jean Jacques Rousseau
Our greatest evils flow from ourselves. Jean Jacques Rousseau
I have suffered too much in this world not to hope for another. Jean Jacques Rousseau
Remorse sleeps during prosperity but awakes bitter consciousness during adversity. Jean Jacques Rousseau
We are reduced to asking others what we are. We never dare to ask ourselves. Jean Jacques Rousseau
We pity in others only the those evils which we ourselves have experienced. Jean Jacques Rousseau
The animals you eat are not those who devour others; you do not eat the carnivorous beasts, you take them as your pattern. You only hunger for the sweet and gentle creatures which harm no one, which follow you, serve you, and are devoured by you as the reward of their service. Jean Jacques Rousseau
Temperance and labor are the two best physicians of man; labor sharpens the appetite, and temperance prevents from indulging to excess. Jean Jacques Rousseau
Religious persecutors are not believers, they are rascals. Jean Jacques Rousseau
Do not base your life on the judgments of others; first, because they are as likely to be mistaken as you are, and further, because you cannot know that they are telling you their true thoughts. Jean Jacques Rousseau
Childhood is the sleep of reason. Jean Jacques Rousseau
It is too difficult to think nobly when one thinks only of earning a living. Jean Jacques Rousseau
Base souls have no faith in great individuals. Jean Jacques Rousseau
I would rather be a man of paradoxes than a man of prejudices. Jean Jacques Rousseau
I have always said and felt that true enjoyment can not be described. Jean Jacques Rousseau
The money that we possess is the instrument of liberty, that which we lack and strive to obtain is the instrument of slavery. Jean Jacques Rousseau
I undertake the same project as Montaigne, but with an aim contrary to his own for he wrote his Essays only for others, and I write my reveries only for myself. Jean Jacques Rousseau
Gratitude is a duty which ought to be paid, but which none have a right to expect. Jean Jacques Rousseau
The first step towards vice is to shroud innocent actions in mystery, and whoever likes to conceal something sooner or later has reason to conceal it. Jean Jacques Rousseau
I love idleness. I love to busy myself about trifles, to begin a hundred things and not finish one of them, to come and go as my fancy bids me, to change my plan every moment, to follow a fly in all its circlings, to try and uproot a rock to see what is underneath, eagerly to begin a ten years task to give it up after ten minutes in short, to fritter away the whole day inconsequentially and incoherently, and to follow nothing but the whim of the moment. Jean Jacques Rousseau
We do not know what is really good or bad fortune. Jean Jacques Rousseau
Had I no other proof of the immortality of the soul than the oppression of the just and the triumph of the wicked in this world, this alone would prevent my having the least doubt of it. So shocking a discord amidst a general harmony of things would make me naturally look for a cause; I should say to myself we do not cease to exist with this life; everything reassumes its order after death. Jean Jacques Rousseau
How many famous and high Spirited heroes have lived a day too long? Jean Jacques Rousseau
Reading, solitude, idleness, a soft and sedentary life, intercourse with women and young people, these are perilous paths for a young man, and these lead him constantly into danger. Jean Jacques Rousseau
Great men never make bad use of their superiority. They see it and feel it and are not less modest. The more they have, the more they know their own deficiencies. Jean Jacques Rousseau
People who know little are usually great talkers, while men who know much say little. Jean Jacques Rousseau
All of my misfortunes come from having thought too well of my fellows. Jean Jacques Rousseau
What wisdom can you find that is greater than kindness? Jean Jacques Rousseau
Not all the subtilties of metaphysics can make me doubt a moment of the immortality of the soul, and of a beneficent Providence. I feel it, I believe it, I desire it, I hope it, and will defend it to my last breath. Jean Jacques Rousseau
Nature never deceives us; it is we who deceive ourselves. Jean Jacques Rousseau
I long remained a child, and I am still one in many respects. Jean Jacques Rousseau
Man was born free, and he is everywhere in chains. Jean Jacques Rousseau
Conscience is the voice of the soul, the passions are the voice of the body. Is it astonishing that often these two languages contradict each other, and then to which must we listen? Too often reason deceives us; we have only too much acquired the right of refusing to listen to it; but conscience never deceives us; it is the true guide of man; it is to man what instinct is to the body; which follows it, obeys nature, and never is afraid of going astray. Jean Jacques Rousseau
Every man has the right to risk his own life in order to preserve it. Has it ever been said that a man who throws himself out the window to escape from a fire is guilty of suicide? Jean Jacques Rousseau
In the strict sense of the term, a true democracy has never existed, and never will exist. Jean Jacques Rousseau
Those that are most slow in making a promise are the most faithful in the performance of it. Jean Jacques Rousseau
