Why Voltaire Said: You Must Cultivate Your Own Garden

Voltaire's phrase - you must cultivate your own garden - is one of the most famous statements in the world. But what did Voltaire mean by this - and what can we learn from it to help us live our lives today? Here is a recipe for how to survive our troubled times. Enjoying our Youtube videos? Get full access to all our audio content, videos, and thousands of thought-provoking articles, conversation cards and more with The School of Life Subscription: https://t.ly/CoIeK Be more mindful, present and inspired. Get the best of The School of Life delivered straight to your inbox: https://t.ly/rdl4D FURTHER READING You can read more on this and other subjects here: https://bit.ly/3mtAWkg “It is crucial to note the subtitle of 18th century Europe’s most famous novel, written in three inspired days in 1759: ‘Candide – or Optimism’. If there was one central target that its author wanted satirically to destroy, it was the hope of his age, a hope that centered around science, love, technical progress and reason. Voltaire was enraged. Of course science wasn’t going to improve the world; it would merely give new power to tyrants. Of course philosophy would not be able to explain away the problem of evil; it would only show up our vanity. Of course love was an illusion; power a chimera, humans irredeemably wicked, and the future absurd. Of all this his readers were to be left in no doubt. Hope was a disease and it was Voltaire’s generous goal to try to cure us of it…” MORE SCHOOL OF LIFE Watch more films on SELF in our playlist: http://bit.ly/TSOLself SOCIAL MEDIA Feel free to follow us at the links below: Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/theschooloflifelondon/ X: https://twitter.com/TheSchoolOfLife Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/theschooloflifelondon/ CREDITS Produced in collaboration with: Gabriella marsh https://gabriellamarsh.com/ Title animation produced in collaboration with Vale Productions https://www.valeproductions.co.uk/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices