Candide

by Voltaire

"My friend, you see how perishable are the riches of this world; there is nothing solid but virtue, and the happiness of seeing Cunegonde once more."

"Alas!" said Candide, "it is the madness of maintaining that everything is right when it is wrong."

"It is true," said Candide; "there is something diabolical in this affair."

"But for what end, then, has this world been formed?" said Candide. "To plague us to death," answered Martin.

"if hawks have always had the same character why should you imagine that men may have changed theirs?"

"You are very hard of belief," said Candide. "I have lived," said Martin.

"it is noble to write as one thinks; this is the privilege of humanity.

Martin especially concluded that man was born to live either in a state of distracting inquietude or of lethargic disgust.

"for when man was first placed in the Garden of Eden, he was put there ut operaretur eum, that he might cultivate it; which shows that man was not born to be idle."