Q0063

Voltaire

A verified English rendering from the curated archive.

English

We must cultivate our garden.
Thinker Voltaire
School Enlightenment
Source Candide, Ch. 30
Theme Action
Another quotation More from this thinker

Source context

This English passage is associated with Candide, Ch. 30, within the tradition of Enlightenment. The wording below is a verified rendering prepared for careful reading rather than a claim of unique translation authority.

A short reading

Read in the register of action, the sentence asks the reader to test an assumption rather than to collect a slogan. In Voltaire's wider work, similar claims are usually offered as prompts for judgment: what would have to be true for the sentence to hold, and what would follow if it did?

How to cite this quotation

APA: Voltaire. (n.d.). We must cultivate our garden. In Philosophy Blind Box. https://www.philosophydef.com/quotes/q0063

MLA: Voltaire. “We must cultivate our garden..” Philosophy Blind Box, https://www.philosophydef.com/quotes/q0063.

Chicago: Voltaire. “We must cultivate our garden..” Philosophy Blind Box. Accessed 2026. https://www.philosophydef.com/quotes/q0063.

Same thinker

More from Voltaire

  1. Doubt is not a pleasant condition, but certainty is an absurd one.
  2. Men must tolerate one another.
  3. If God did not exist, it would be necessary to invent him.
  4. I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.

All quotations by Voltaire

Same theme

More on action

  1. The human good is activity of soul in accordance with virtue.
  2. It is not because things are difficult that we do not dare; it is because we do not dare that they are difficult.
  3. If you wish to be loved, love.
  4. Men, not Man, live on the earth and inhabit the world.
  5. Believe that life is worth living, and your belief will help create the fact.

Browse the action theme