Q0087

Jean-Paul Sartre

A verified English rendering from the curated archive.

English

Existence precedes essence.
Thinker Jean-Paul Sartre
School Existentialism
Source Existentialism Is a Humanism
Theme Freedom
Another quotation More from this thinker

Source context

This English passage is associated with Existentialism Is a Humanism, within the tradition of Existentialism. 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 freedom, the sentence asks the reader to test an assumption rather than to collect a slogan. In Jean-Paul Sartre'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: Jean-Paul Sartre. (n.d.). Existence precedes essence. In Philosophy Blind Box. https://www.philosophydef.com/quotes/q0087

MLA: Jean-Paul Sartre. “Existence precedes essence..” Philosophy Blind Box, https://www.philosophydef.com/quotes/q0087.

Chicago: Jean-Paul Sartre. “Existence precedes essence..” Philosophy Blind Box. Accessed 2026. https://www.philosophydef.com/quotes/q0087.

Same thinker

More from Jean-Paul Sartre

  1. Man is condemned to be free.
  2. In choosing himself, man chooses all men.
  3. Man is nothing other than what he makes of himself.
  4. Man is a useless passion.

All quotations by Jean-Paul Sartre

Same theme

More on freedom

  1. Extreme freedom seems to change into nothing but extreme slavery.
  2. Of things, some are in our power, and some are not.
  3. It is not things that disturb people, but their judgments about things.
  4. He who has learned how to die has unlearned how to be a slave.
  5. If you are distressed by anything external, it is not the thing itself that disturbs you, but your own judgment about it.

Browse the freedom theme