Disturbances in society are never more fearful than when those who are stirring up the trouble can use the pretext of religion to mask their true designs.
Interpretation
This quote warns against the dangers of using religion as a cover for ulterior motives in society.
Denis Diderot's quote highlights the peril that arises when individuals or groups exploit religion to disguise their true intentions. It suggests that such disturbances can lead to greater chaos and fear in society, as the genuine motivations become obscured behind a veil that is traditionally respected and revered. In essence, it critiques the manipulation of religious sentiments for personal or political gain, indicating that this tactic can lead to severe societal consequences.
In practice
In a speech about the role of religion in modern politics, one might start with this quote to emphasize the need for transparency.
The arbitrary rule of a just and enlightened prince is always bad. His virtues are the most dangerous and the surest form of seduction: they lull a people imperceptibly into the habit of loving, respecting, and serving his successor, whoever that successor may be, no matter how wicked or stupid.
This root [the potato], no matter how much you prepare it, is tasteless and floury. It cannot pass for an agreeable food, but it supplies a food sufficiently abundant and sufficiently healthy for men who ask only to sustain themselves. The potato is criticized with reason for being windy, but what matters windiness for the vigorous organisms of peasants and laborers?
Do you see this egg? With this you can topple every theological theory, every church or temple in the world.
There are three principal means of acquiring knowledge... observation of nature, reflection, and experimentation. Observation collects facts; reflection combines them; experimentation verifies the result of that combination.
In order to get as much fame as one's father one has to much more able than he.
All abstract sciences are nothing but the study of relations between signs.
Many a professing Christian is a stumbling-block because his worship is divided. On Sunday he worships God; on weekdays God has little or no place in his thoughts.
For until men recognize that they owe everything to God, that they are nourished by His fatherly care, that He is the Author of their every good, that they should seek nothing beyond Him - they will never yield Him willing service. Nay, unless they establish their complete happiness in Him, they will never give themselves truly and sincerely to Him.
But the guilty person is only one of the targets of punishment. For punishment is directed above all at others, at all the potentially guilty.
For when God forbids us to kill, he not only prohibits us from open violence, which is not even allowed by the public laws, but he warns us against the commission of those beings which are esteemed lawful among men....Therefore, with regard to this precept of God, there ought to be no exception at all, but that it is always unlawful to put to death a man, whom God willed to be a sacred animal.
The essence of being human is that one does not seek perfection.
Everyone, including the Athenians [...] are right to accept advice from anyone, since it is incumbent on everyone to share in that sort of excellence, or else there can be no city at all.
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