Ernest Renan quotes

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Let us remember that sorrow alone is the creator of great things.
Ernest Renan
Sorrow
I can die when I wish to: that is my elixir of life.
Ernest Renan
Life
He whom God has touched will always be a being apart: he is, whatever he may do, a stranger among men; he is marked by a sign.
Ernest Renan
God
Men
Being
May
Will
God, if there is a God, take my soul, if I have a soul.
Ernest Renan
God
Soul
Communism is in conflict with human nature.
Ernest Renan
Nature
Communism
Conflict
Human nature
Blessed are the blind, for they know not enough to ask why.
Ernest Renan
Blind
All the great things of humanity have been accomplished in the name of absolute principles.
Ernest Renan
Humanity
Name
Principles
All history is incomprehensible without Christ.
Ernest Renan
History
Christ
Man makes holy what he believes.
Ernest Renan
Man
As a rule, all heroism is due to a lack of reflection, and thus it is necessary to maintain a mass of imbeciles. If they once understand themselves the ruling men will be lost.
Ernest Renan
Men
Heroism
Reflection
Will
To conceive the good, in fact, is not sufficient; it must be made to succeed among men. To accomplish this less pure paths must be followed.
Ernest Renan
Men
Fact
Succeed
No idea can succeed except at the expense of sacrifice; no one ever escapes without enduring strain from the struggle of life.
Ernest Renan
Life
Idea
Sacrifice
Struggle
Succeed
In morals, truth is but little prized when it is a mere sentiment, and only attains its full value when realized in the world as fact.
Ernest Renan
Truth
Fact
Morals
Sentiment
Value
World
When people complain of life, it is almost always because they have asked impossible things of it.
Ernest Renan
Life
People
The simplest schoolboy is now familiar with truths for which Archimedes would have sacrificed his life.
Ernest Renan
Life
Now