Maximilien Robespierre Quotes

#1. Omelets are not made without breaking eggs.

Maximilien Robespierre

#2. By sealing our work with our blood, we may see at least the bright dawn of universal happiness.

Maximilien Robespierre

#3. Any institution which does not suppose the people good, and the magistrate corruptible, is evil.

Maximilien Robespierre

#4. Food that is necessary for man's existence is as sacred as life itself. Everything that is indispensable for its preservation is the common property of society as a whole. It is only the surplus that is private property and can be safely left to individual commercial enterprise.

Maximilien Robespierre

#5. Citizens, did you want a revolution without revolution?

Maximilien Robespierre

#6. Crime butchers innocence to secure a throne, and innocence struggles with all its might against the attempts of crime.

Maximilien Robespierre

#7. The revolution is the war of liberty against its enemies. The constitution is the rule of liberty against its enemies. The constitution is the rule of liberty when victorious and peaceable.

Maximilien Robespierre

#8. Any law which violates the inalienable rights of man is essentially unjust and tyrannical; it is not a law at all.

Maximilien Robespierre

#9. One can ... never create [freedom] by an invading force.

Maximilien Robespierre

#10. No one loves armed missionaries.

Maximilien Robespierre

#11. Softness to traitors will destroy us all.

Maximilien Robespierre

#12. Atheism is aristocratic; the idea of a great Being that watches over oppressed innocence and punishes triumphant crime is altogether popular.

Maximilien Robespierre

#13. Is it to be thought unreasonable that the people, in atonement for wrongs of a century, demand the vengeance of a single day?

Maximilien Robespierre

#14. It is with regret that I pronounce the fatal truth: Louis ought to perish rather than a hundred thousand virtuous citizens; Louis must die that the country may live

Maximilien Robespierre

#15. The aim of constitutional government is to preserve the Republic; that of revolutionary government is to lay its foundation.

Maximilien Robespierre

#16. Terror is only justice: prompt, severe and inflexible; it is then an emanation of virtue; it is less a distinct principle than a natural consequence of the general principle of democracy, applied to the most pressing wants of the country.

Maximilien Robespierre

#17. Terror is nothing more than justice, prompt, secure and inflexible.

Maximilien Robespierre

#18. We must smother the internal and external enemies of the Republic or perish with it; now in this situation, the first maxim of your policy ought to be to lead the people by reason and the people's enemies by terror.

Maximilien Robespierre

#19. When a Banker jumps out of a window, jump after him - that's where the money is.

Maximilien Robespierre

#20. Pity is treason.

Maximilien Robespierre

#21. Establish liberty on a rock of brass.

Maximilien Robespierre

#22. Again, it may be said, that to love justice and equality the people need no great effort of virtue; it is sufficient that they love themselves.

Maximilien Robespierre

#23. A true revolutionary should be ready to perish in the process

Maximilien Robespierre