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Moses Mendelssohn Quotes

1729–1786 Germany

Moses Mendelssohn (6 September 1729 – 4 January 1786) was a German Jewish philosopher.

Germany
Philosophers
Theologians
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Random Moses Mendelssohn quote

3 quotes

Divine religion ... does not prod men with an iron rod; it guides them with bands of love. It draws no avenging sword, dispenses no temporal goods, assumes no right to any earthly possessions, and claims no external power over the mind. Its weapons are reason and persuasion; its strength is the divine power of truth.

Jerusalem, or on Religious Power and Judaism (1783)

We teach and instruct one another only through writings; we learn to know nature and man only through writings. We work and relax, edify and amuse ourselves through overmuch writing. ... Everything is dead letter; the spirit of living conversation has vanished.

The state gives orders and coerces, religion teaches and persuades. The state prescribes laws, religion commandments. The state has physical power and uses it when necessary; the power of religion is love and benificence. The one abandons the disobedient and expels him; the other receives him in its bosom and seeks to instruct, or at least to console him.

Jerusalem, or on Religious Power and Judaism (1783)

Attribution

Quotes and notes from Wikiquote: Moses Mendelssohn (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0.