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Maximilien Robespierre

79 quotes

“Democracy is a state in which the sovereign people, guided by laws which are its own work, does for itself all that it can do properly, and through delegates all that it cannot do for itself.”
Maximilien Robespierre (1758–1794) said by 1794 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Indulgence for the royalists, cry certain men, mercy for the villains! No! mercy for the innocent, mercy for the weak, mercy for the unfortunate, mercy for humanity.”
Maximilien Robespierre (1758–1794) said by 1794 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“If the mainspring of popular government in peacetime is virtue, the mainspring of popular government in revolution is both virtue and terror: virtue, without which terror is disastrous; terror, without which virtue is powerless. Terror is nothing but prompt, severe, inflexible justice; it is therefore an emanation of virtue; it is not so much a specific principle as a consequence of the general principle of democracy applied to our homeland’s most pressing needs.”
Maximilien Robespierre (1758–1794) said by 1794 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The government in a revolution is the despotism of liberty against tyranny.”
Maximilien Robespierre (1758–1794) said by 1794 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“We must smother the internal and external enemies of the Republic or perish with it; now in this situation, the first maxim of your policy ought to be to lead the people by reason and the people's enemies by terror.”
Maximilien Robespierre (1758–1794) said by 1794 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Since virtue and equality are the soul of the republic, and that your aim is to found, to consolidate the republic, it follows, that the first rule of your political conduct should be, to let all your measures tend to maintain equality and encourage virtue, for the first care of the legislator should be to strengthen the principles on which the government rests. Hence all that tends to excite a love of country, to purify manners, to exalt the mind, to direct the passions of the human heart towards the public good, you should adopt and establish.”
Maximilien Robespierre (1758–1794) said by 1794 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“All that tends to... debase them into selfish egotism, to awaken an infatuation for littlenesses, and a disregard for greatness, you should reject or repress. In the system of the French revolution that which is immoral is impolitic, and what tends to corrupt is counter-revolutionary. Weaknesses, vices, prejudices are the road to monarchy. Carried away, too often perhaps, by the force of ancient habits, as well as by the innate imperfection of human nature, to false ideas and pusillanimous sentiments, we have more to fear from the excesses of weakness, than from excesses of energy.”
Maximilien Robespierre (1758–1794) said by 1794 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Happily virtue is natural in the people, [despite] aristocratical prejudices. A nation is truly corrupt, when, after having, by degrees lost its character and liberty, it slides from democracy into aristocracy or monarchy; this is the death of the political body by decrepitude....”
Maximilien Robespierre (1758–1794) said by 1794 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“But, when, by prodigious effects of courage and of reason, a whole people break asunder the fetters of despotism to make of the fragments trophies to liberty; when, by their innate vigor, they rise in a manner from the arms of death, to resume all the strength of youth when, in turns forgiving and inexorable, intrepid and docile, they can neither be checked by impregnable ramparts, nor by innumerable armies of tyrants leagued against them, and yet of themselves stop at the voice of the law; if then they do not reach the heights of their destiny it can only be the fault of those who govern.”
Maximilien Robespierre (1758–1794) said by 1794 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Crime butchers innocence to secure a throne, and innocence struggles with all its might against the attempts of crime.”
Maximilien Robespierre (1758–1794) said by 1794 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Death is not "an eternal sleep!" Citizens! efface from the tomb that motto, graven by sacrilegious hands, which spreads over all nature a funereal crape, takes from oppressed innocence its support, and affronts the beneficent dispensation of death! Inscribe rather thereon these words: "Death is the commencement of immortality!”
Maximilien Robespierre (1758–1794) first seen 1794 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Last speech to the National Convention (26 July 1794), reported in The World's Famous Orations (New York, 1906)
“But there do exist, I can assure you, souls that are feeling and pure; it exists, that tender, imperious and irresistible passion, the torment and delight of magnanimous hearts; that deep horror of tyranny, that compassionate zeal for the oppressed, that sacred love for the homeland, that even more sublime and holy love for humanity, without which a great revolution is just a noisy crime that destroys another crime; it does exist, that generous ambition to establish here on earth the world’s first Republic.”
Maximilien Robespierre (1758–1794) said by 1794 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“This egotism of non-degraded men, which finds a heavenly delight in the calmness of a pure conscience and in the ravishing spectacle of the public good, you feel it in this moment which burns in your souls; I feel it in mine.”
Maximilien Robespierre (1758–1794) said by 1794 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The confirmation of the Republic has been my object; and I know that the Republic can be established only on the eternal basis of morality.”
Maximilien Robespierre (1758–1794) said by 1794 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“But how would our vile calumniators la feel it? How would the man born blind not have the idea of light? Nature has refused them a soul; they have some right to doubt, not only the immortality of the soul, but its existence.”
Maximilien Robespierre (1758–1794) said by 1794 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“People, remember that, if justice doesn’t reign with absolute power in the Republic, and if this word doesn’t mean the love of equality and of the patrie, liberty is but a vain name! People, you who are feared, whom one flatters and is misunderstood; you, recognized [as] sovereign, which is always treated as a slave, remember that everywhere where justice doesn’t reign, the passions of the magistrates [do], and that the people has changed [its] shackles, and not [its] fate!”
Maximilien Robespierre (1758–1794) said by 1794 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I leave to the oppressors of humanity a terrible testament, which I proclaim with the independence befitting one whose career is so nearly ended; it is the awful truth: “Thou shalt die!”
Maximilien Robespierre (1758–1794) said by 1794 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I am made to combat crime, not to govern it. The time is not here where good men can serve their patrie with impunity; the defenders of liberty will only be outcasts, as long as the horde of rogues is in control.”
Maximilien Robespierre (1758–1794) said by 1794 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“My life? Oh, my life I abandon without a regret! I have seen the Past; and I foresee the Future. What friend of his country would wish to survive the moment when he could no longer serve it — when he could no longer defend innocence against oppression?”
Maximilien Robespierre (1758–1794) said by 1794 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“With this speech, I have signed my own death sentence. I saw today that the league of miscreants is too strong, that I cannot hope to escape. I die without regrets, I leave you my legacy, it will be dear to you and you will defend it.”
Maximilien Robespierre (1758–1794) said by 1794 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Things have been said to you about the Jews that are infinitely exaggerated and often contrary to history. How can the persecutions they have suffered at the hands of different peoples be held against them? These on the contrary are national crimes that we ought to expiate, by granting them imprescriptible human rights of which no human power could despoil them. Faults are still imputed to them, prejudices, exaggerated by the sectarian spirit and by interests. But to what can we really impute them but our own injustices? After having excluded them from all honours, even the right to public esteem, we have left them with nothing but the objects of lucrative speculation. Let us deliver them to happiness, to the homeland, to virtue, by granting them the dignity of men and citizens; let us hope that it can never be policy, whatever people say, to condemn to degradation and oppression a multitude of men who live among us. How could the social interest be based on violation of the eternal principles of justice and reason that are the foundations of every human society?”
Maximilien Robespierre (1758–1794) first seen 1789 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: On Voting Rights for Actors and Jews" (21 December 1789)
“The policy of the London Cabinet largely contributed to the first movement of our Revolution …Taking advantage of political tempests (the cabinet) aimed to effect in an exhausted and dismembered France a change of dynasty and to place the Duke of York on the throne of Louis XVI … Pitt … is an imbecile, whatever may be said of a reputation that has been much too greatly puffed up. A man who, abusing the influence acquired by him on an island placed haphazard in the ocean, is desirous of contending with the French people, could not have conceived of such an absurd plan elsewhere than in a madhouse.”
Maximilien Robespierre (1758–1794) first seen 1793 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Quotes from speeches (17 November 1793 & 26 January 1794) in La Révolution: III – Le Gouvernement Révolutionnaire (1883) by Hippolyte Taine, translated as The Revolution Vol. 3 (1885), by John Durand, Book 7 : The Gover…
“To defend the oppressed against their oppressors, to plead the cause of the weak against the strong who exploit and crush them, this is the duty of all hearts that have not been spoiled by egoism and corruption… It is so sweet to devote oneself to one’s fellows that I do not know how there can be so many unfortunates still without support or defenders. As for me, my life’s task will be to help those who suffer and to pursue through my avenging speech those who take pleasure in the pain of others. How happy I will be if my feeble efforts are crowned with success and if, at the price of my devotion and sacrifices, my reputation is not tarnished by the crimes of the oppressors I will fight.”
Maximilien Robespierre (1758–1794) said by 1794 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The law, the public authority: is it not established to protect weakness against injustice and oppression? It is thus an offence to all social principles place it entirely in the hands of the rich. But the rich, the powerful, have reasoned differently, Through a strange abuse of words, they have restricted the general idea of property to certain objects only; they have called only themselves property owners: they have claimed that only property owners were worthy of the name of citizen; they have named their own particular interest the general interest, and to ensure the success of that claim, they have seized all social power.”
Maximilien Robespierre (1758–1794) said by 1794 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“No doubt if all men were just and virtuous; if cupidity were never tempted to devour the people’s substance; if the rich, receptive to the voices of reason and nature, regarded themselves as the bursars of society, or as brothers to the poor, it might be possible to recognize no law but the most unlimited freedom; but if it is true that avarice can speculate on the misery and tyranny itself on the despair of the people; if it is true that all the passions declare war on suffering humanity, then why should not the law repress these abuses? Why should it not stay the homicidal hand of the monopolist, as it does that of the common murderer? Why should it not concern itself with the subsistence of the people, after caring so long for the pleasures of the great, and the power of despots?”
Maximilien Robespierre (1758–1794) said by 1794 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I utter this deadly truth with regret, but Louis must die, because the homeland has to live. Among a peaceable, free people, respected at home and abroad, you might listen to the advice being given you to be generous; but a people whose liberty is still being disputed after so many sacrifices and battles, a people in whose country the laws are still only inexorable towards the unfortunate, a people in whose country the crimes of tyranny are still subjects of dispute, such a people must want to be avenged; and the generosity for which you are being praised would resemble too much that of a society of bandits sharing out spoils.”
Maximilien Robespierre (1758–1794) said by 1794 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“We wish in our country that morality may be substituted for egotism, probity for false honour, principles for usages, duties for good manners, the empire of reason for the tyranny of fashion, a contempt of vice for a contempt of misfortune, pride for insolence, magnanimity for vanity, the love of glory for the love of money, good people for good company, merit for intrigue, genius for wit, truth for tinsel show, the attractions of happiness for the ennui of sensuality, the grandeur of man for the littleness of the great, a people magnanimous, powerful, happy, for a people amiable, frivolous and miserable; in a word, all the virtues and miracles of a Republic instead of all the vices and absurdities of a Monarchy.”
Maximilien Robespierre (1758–1794) said by 1794 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The warmth of zeal is not perhaps the most dangerous rock that we have to avoid; but rather that languour which ease produces and a distrust of our own courage. Therefore continually wind up the sacred spring of republican government, instead of letting it run down. I need not say that I am not here justifying any excess. Principles the most sacred may be abused: the wisdom of government should guide its operations according to circumstances, it should time its measures, choose its means; for the manner of bringing about great things is an essential part of the talent of producing them, just as wisdom is an essential attribute of virtue....”
Maximilien Robespierre (1758–1794) said by 1794 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“To punish the oppressors of humanity is clemency; to forgive them is cruelty. The severity of tyrants has barbarity for its principle; that of a republican government is founded on beneficence. Therefore let him beware who should dare to influence the people by that terror which is made only for their enemies! Let him beware, who, regarding the inevitable errors of civism in the same light, with the premeditated crimes of perfidiousness, or the attempts of conspirators, suffers the dangerous intriguer to escape and pursues the peaceable citizen! Death to the villain who dares abuse the sacred name of liberty or the powerful arms intended for her defence, to carry mourning or death to the patriotic heart...”
Maximilien Robespierre (1758–1794) said by 1794 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source