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It is the privilege of true genius, and certainly of the genius that opens a new road, to make without punishment great mistakes.

C'est le privilège du vrai génie, et surtout du génie qui ouvre une carrière, de faire impunément de grandes fautes.

Original text (French)

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Notes from Wikiquote

"Siècle de Louis XIV", ch. 32 (1751), qtd. in Arthur Schopenhauer, The World as Will and Representation (1818), "Criticism of the Kantian philosophy"

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Intelligence

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There are truths which are not for all men, nor for all times.

It is very strange that men should deny a creator and yet attribute to themselves the power of creating eels.

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Satire lies about literary men while they live and eulogy lies about them when they die.

We have never intended to enlighten shoemakers and servants—this is up to apostles.

Whoe'er thou art, thy master see;
He was—or is—or is to be.

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Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Voltaire (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.