My passions, concentrated on a single point, resemble the rays of a sun assembled by a magnifying glass: they immediately set fire to whatever object they find in their way.
Marquis De SadeRead
For mortal men there is but one hell, and that is the folly and wickedness and spite of his fellows; but once his life is over, there's an end to it: his annihilation is final and entire, of him nothing survives.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Human suffering is rooted in the actions of others, and death brings an end to individual existence.
Marquis De Sade's quote explores the idea that the greatest source of torment for human beings comes from the negative behaviors of those around them. He suggests that while individuals suffer because of the folly, wickedness, and spite of others, the finality of death means that this suffering also has an endpoint, leading to complete annihilation, where nothing of the individual remains after life.
Themes
SufferingDeathAn AnnihilationHuman ConductPhilosophy
In practice
Example use cases
During a philosophical discussion on the nature of suffering in a classroom.
More from Marquis De Sade
All quotes →So long as the laws remain such as they are today, employ some discretion: loud opinion forces us to do so; but in privacy and silence let us compensate ourselves for that cruel chastity we are obliged to display in public.
Marquis De SadeRead
Happiness is an abstraction, it is a product of the imagination, it is a way of being moved, which depends entirely on our way of seeing and feeling.
Marquis De SadeRead
Are your convictions so fragile that mine cannot stand in opposition to them? Is your God so illusory that the presence of my Devil reveals his insufficiency?
Marquis De SadeRead
The mechanism that directs government cannot be virtuous, because it is impossible to thwart every crime, to protect oneself from every criminal without being criminal too; that which directs corrupt mankind must be corrupt itself; and it will never be by means of virtue, virtue being inert and passive, that you will maintain control over vice, which is ever active: the governor must be more energetic than the governed.
Marquis De SadeRead
Prejudice is the sole author of infamies: how many acts are so qualified by an opinion forged out of naught but prejudice!
Marquis De SadeRead
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