Jean-Paul Marat quotes

Jean-Paul Marat was a French political theorist, physician, and journalist, prominent during the French Revolution. His passionate writings and radical views made him a leading voice among the revolutionary Jacobins. He became a controversial figure, ultimately assassinated for his influential role. Here are 11 of his quotes:

No, liberty is not made for us: we are too ignorant, too vain, too presumptious, too cowardly, too vile, too corrupt, too attached to rest and to pleasure, too much slaves to fortune to ever know the true price of liberty. We boast of being free! To show how much we have become slaves, it is enough just to cast a glance on the capital and examine the morals of its inhabitants. (Jean-Paul Marat)
Five or six hundred [aristocratic] heads lopped off would have assured you repose and happiness; a false humanity has restrained your arm and suspended your blows; it will cost the lives of millions of your brothers. View quote
Jean-Paul Marat
To form a truly free constitution, that's to say, truly just and wise, the first point, the main point, the capital point, is that all the laws be agreed on by the people, after considered reflection, and especially having taken time to see what's at stake... View quote
Jean-Paul Marat
Five or six hundred heads cut off would have assured your repose, freedom and happiness. View quote
Jean-Paul Marat
God has always been hard on the poor. View quote
Jean-Paul Marat
Robespierre listened to me with terror. He grew pale and silent for some time. This interview confirmed me in the opinion that I always had of him, that he unites the knowledge of a wise senator with the integrity of a thoroughly good man and the zeal of a true patriot but that he is lacking as a statesman in clearness of vision and determination. View quote
Jean-Paul Marat
How could liberty ever have established itself amongst us? Apart from several tragic scenes, the revolution has been nothing but a web of farcical scenes... But it is in the nation's senate that the most grotesque parades have taken place. View quote
Jean-Paul Marat
People, give thanks to the gods! Your most redoubtable enemy has fallen beneath the scythe of Fate. Riquetti [Mirabeau] is no more; he dies victim of his numerous treasons, victim of his too tardy scruples, victim of the barbarous foresight of his atrocious accomplices. Adroit rogues who are to be found in all circles have sought to play upon your pity, and already duped by their false discourse, you mourn this traitor as the most zealous of your defenders; they have represented his death as a public calamity, and you bewail him as a hero, as the saviour of your country, who has sacrificed himself for you. Will you always be deaf to the voice of prudence; will you always sacrifice public affairs to your blindness? View quote
Jean-Paul Marat
Robertspiere [sic], Robertspiere alone in vain raised his voice against the perfidious decree regarding superior conscripts, but his voice was muffled. View quote
Jean-Paul Marat
Fifty years of anarchy await you, and you will emerge from it only by the power of some dictator who will arise- a true statesman and patriot. O prating people, if you did but know how to act! View quote
Jean-Paul Marat
All the ambitious, who the cupidity of the court can no longer satisfy and the public functionaries it can no longer corrupt, will throw themselves into this party. The successive uprisings will be followed by a general uprising, and the satellites and the privileged henchmen of the prince will fall beneath the blows of the discontented, he himself will be thrown from the throne and proscribed along with his unworthy family. The kingdom will be torn apart by different factions. From the fire of civil dissension several federated republics will be born; the most audacious and skillful citizens will usurp the empire, will subject the multitude to a new yoke, and the government will have changed form without having re-established freedom. (Jean-Paul Marat)