Morality when it is formal, devours life is what Albert Camus wrote in his book-length essay titled “The Rebel”.
The original line in French is:
“La morale , quand elle est formelle , dévore.”
This quote is mentioned in the sub-paragraph “The Religion of Virtue“.
Camus quoted Louis Antoine Léon de Saint-Just saying morality is stronger than tyrants.
And it was morality that killed Louis XVI.
He went on to say all form of disobedience to law is because a lack of virtue in the obstinate citizen.
I think what Camus was saying is that formal morality can be oppressive to people.
Remember Albert Camus wrote about morality in his Notebook Volume One:
“If I had to write a book on morality, it would have a hundred pages and ninety-nine would be blank. On the last page I should write: “I recognize only one duty, and that is to love.” – Albert Camus
(Notebooks: 1935-1942: Translated From The French And With A Preface And Notes By Philip. Thody, New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1963, Notebook I, May 1935-September 1937, Thursday, September 9, P. 54) source
(The quote is also found here.)
So, what say you?
Morality when it is formal, devours?
Below I have gathered a great selection of Albert Camus quotes taken from his 1951 essay that focused on diagnosing the metaphysical significance of rebellion and revolution.
The book “The Rebel” (French: L’Homme Révolté) was written by Albert Camus.
As I have mentioned above, it is about the metaphysical and the historical development of rebellion and revolution in societies.
In this book, Camus mentions a couple of famous writers and artists, including Epicurus, Lucretius, the Marquis de Sade, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Friedrich Nietzsche, Max Stirner, André Breton and others.
According to Albert Camus, a rebel is a man who says no, but whose refusal does not imply a renunciation.
The rebel is also a man who says yes, from the moment he makes his first gesture of rebellion.
French philosopher, author, and journalist Camus states that despair, like the absurd, has opinions and desires about everything in general and nothing in particular.
Silence expresses this attitude very well.
In this essay, Albert Camus argues that an act of rebellion is not, essentially, an egoistic act.
The Nobel Prize Laureate in Literature notes that rebellion does not arise only, and necessarily, among the oppressed, but that it can also be caused by the mere spectacle of oppression of which someone else is the victim.
You can read all this interesting stuff in this book which was published way back in 1951.
Morality When It Is Formal Devours
Now, let’s go through my selection of profound Albert Camus The Rebel quotes.
“…philosophy, which can be used for any purpose – even for transforming murderers into judges.” – Albert Camus
“…la philosophie qui peut servir à tout, même à changer les meurtriers en juges.” (French)
“Once crime was as solitary as a cry of protest; now it is as universal as science. Yesterday it was put on trial; today it determines the law.” – Albert Camus
“Il était solitaire comme le cri, le voilà universel comme la science. Hier jugé, il légifère aujourd’hui.” (French)
“Evil and virtue are mere chance or caprice.” – Albert Camus
“Malice et vertu sont hasard ou caprice.” (French)
“Man is the only creature who refuses to be what he is.” – Albert Camus
“L’homme est la seule créature qui refuse d’être ce qu’elle est.” (French)
“What is a rebel? A man who says no.” – Albert Camus
“Qu’est-ce qu’un homme révolté ? Un homme qui dit non.” (French)
“With rebellion, awareness is born.” – Albert Camus
“La conscience vient au jour avec la révolte.” (French)
(The quote in French is also found in: L’Homme Révolté Par Albert Camus, Paris: Gallimard, 1966, I. L’Homme Révolté, P. 27) source
“In order to exist, man must rebel, but rebellion must respect the limit it discovers in itself…” – Albert Camus
“Pour être, l’homme doit se révolter, mais sa révolte doit respecter la limite…” (French)
“Nihilism is not only despair and negation, but above all the desire to despair and to negate.” – Albert Camus
“Le nihilisme n’est pas seulement désespoir et négation, mais surtout volonté de désespérer et de nier.” (French)
“Without law there is no freedom.” – Albert Camus
“Sans loi, point de liberté.” (French)
“Every rebellion implies some kind of unity.” – Albert Camus
“Toute révolte suppose une unité.” (French)
“Absolute freedom mocks at justice. Absolute justice denies freedom. To be fruitful, the two ideas must find their limits in each other.” – Albert Camus
“La liberté absolue raille la justice. La justice absolue nie la liberté. Pour être fécondes, les deux notions doivent trouver, l’une dans l’autre, leur limite.” (French)
“… nothing can discourage the appetite for divinity in the heart of man.” – Albert Camus
“… rien ne peut décourager l’appétit de divinité au cœur de l’homme.” (French)
“All modern revolutions have ended in a reinforcement of the power of the State.” – Albert Camus
“Toutes les révolutions modernes ont abouti à un renforcement de l’État.” (French)
“One leader, one people, signifies one master and millions of slaves.” – Albert Camus
“Un seul chef, un seul peuple, signifie un seul maître et des millions d’esclaves.” (French)
“More and more, revolution has found itself delivered into the hands of its bureaucrats and doctrinaires on the one hand, and to the enfeebled and bewildered masses on the other.” – Albert Camus
“De plus en plus, la révolution s’est trouvée livrée à ses bureaucrates et à ses doctrinaires d’une part, à des masses affaiblies et désorientées d’autre part.” (French)
“To those who despair of everything, not reason but only passion can provide a faith… ” – Albert Camus
“À ceux qui désespèrent de tout, ce ne sont pas les raisonnements qui peuvent rendre une foi, mais la seule passion… “ (French)
“Methods of thought which claim to give the lead to our world in the name of revolution have become, in reality, ideologies of consent and not of rebellion.” – Albert Camus
“Les pensées qui prétendent mener notre monde au nom de la révolution sont devenues en réalité des idéologies de consentement, non de révolte.” (French)
“Revolution, in order to be creative, cannot do without either a moral or metaphysical rule to balance the insanity of history.” – Albert Camus
“La révolution pour être créatrice ne peut se passer d’une règle, morale ou métaphysique, qui équilibre le délire historique.” (French)
“If man wants to become God, he arrogates to himself the power of life or death over others.” – Albert Camus
“Si l’homme veut se faire Dieu, il s’arroge le droit de vie ou de mort sur les autres.” (French)
“… instead of killing and dying in order to produce the being that we are not, we have to live and let live in order to create what we are.” – Albert Camus
“… qu’au lieu de tuer et mourir pour produire l’être que nous ne sommes pas, nous avons à vivre et faire vivre pour créer ce que nous sommes.” (French)
“Every revolutionary ends by becoming either an oppressor or a heretic.” – Albert Camus
“Tout révolutionnaire finit en oppresseur ou en hérétique.” (French)
“The French Revolution gave birth to no artists but only to a great journalist, Desmoulins, and to a clandestine writer, Sade.” – Albert Camus
“La Révolution française ne fait naître aucun artiste, mais seulement un grand journaliste, Desmoulins, et un écrivain clandestin, Sade.” (French)
“Men are never really willing to die except for the sake of freedom: therefore they do not believe in dying completely.” – Albert Camus
“Le hommes ne sont jamais bien morts que pour la liberté: ils ne croyaient pas alors mourir tout à fait.” (French)
“We all carry within us our places of exile, our crimes, and our ravages. But our task is not to unleash them on the world; it is to fight them in ourselves and in others.” – Albert Camus
“Nous portons tous en nous nos bagnes, nos crimes etnos ravages. Mais notre tâche n’est pas de les déchaîner à travers le monde; elle est de les combattre en nous-mêmes et dans les autres.” (French)
“All the unhappiness of human beings springs from the hope… ” – Albert Camus
“Tout le malheur des hommes vient de l’espérance… “ (French)
“Real generosity toward the future lies in giving all to the present.” – Albert Camus
“La vraie générosité envers l’avenir consiste à tout donner au présent.” (French)
“Absolute justice is achieved by the suppression of all contradiction: therefore it destroys freedom. The revolution to achieve justice, through freedom, ends by aligning them against each other.” – Albert Camus
“La justice absolue passe par la suppression de toute contradiction : elle détruit la liberté . La révolution pour la justice, par la liberté, finit par les dresser l’une contre l’autre.” (French)
“Moderation is not the opposite of rebellion. Rebellion in itself is moderation, and it demands, defends, and re-creates it throughout history and its eternal disturbances.” – Albert Camus
“La mesure n’est pas le contraire de la révolte. C’est la révolte qui est la mesure, qui l’ordonne, la défend et la recrée à travers l’histoire et ses désordres.” (French)
“Every ideology is contrary to human psychology.” – Albert Camus
“Toute idéologie se constitue contre la psychologie.” (French)
“To abandon oneself to principles is really to die – and to die for an impossible love which is the contrary of love.” – Albert Camus
“S’abandonner à eux, c’est mourir, en vérité, et c’est mourir d’un amour impossible qui est le contraire de l’amour.” (French)
“Every act of rebellion expresses a nostalgia for innocence and an appeal to the essence of being.” – Albert Camus
“Chaque révolte est nostalgie d’innocence et appel vers l’être.” (French)
“If we believe in nothing, if nothing has any meaning and if we can affirm no values whatsoever, then everything is possible and nothing has any importance.” – Albert Camus
“Si l’on ne croit à rien, si rien n’a de sens et si nous ne pouvons affirmer aucune valeur, tout est possible et rien n’a d’importance.” (French)
“Evil and virtue are mere chance or caprice.” – Albert Camus
“Malice et vertu sont hasard ou caprice.” (French)
“…rebellion cannot exist without a strange form of love.” – Albert Camus
“…la révolte ne peut se passer d’un étrange amour.” (French)
“Beauty, no doubt, does not make revolutions. But a day will come when revolutions will have need of beauty.” – Albert Camus
“La beauté, sans doute, ne fait pas les révolutions. Mais un jour vient où les révolutions ont besoin d’elle.” (French)
“Whatever we may do, excess will always keep its place in the heart of man, in the place where solitude is found. We all carry within us our places of exile, our crimes and our ravages.” – Albert Camus
“Quoi que nous fassions, la démesure gardera toujours sa place dans le coeur de l’homme, à l’endroit de la solitude. Nous portons tous en nous nos bagnes, nos crimes et nos ravages.” (French)
“…our worst agonies come to an end one day.” – Albert Camus
“…nos pires tortures cesseront un jour.” (French)
“One morning, after many dark nights of despair, an irrepressible longing to live will announce to us the fact that all is finished and that suffering has no more meaning than happiness.” – Albert Camus
“Un matin, après tant de désespoirs, une irrépressible envie de vivre nous annoncera que tout est fini et que la souffrance n’a pas plus de sens que le bonheur.” (French)
“Those who love, friends and lovers, know that love is not only a blinding flash, but also a long and painful struggle in the darkness for the realization of definitive recognition and reconciliation.” – Albert Camus
“Ceux qui s’aiment, les amis, les amants, savent que l’amour n’est pas seulement une fulguration, niais aussi une longue et douloureuse lutte dans les ténèbres pour la reconnaissance et la réconciliation définitives.” (French)
“Actual freedom has not increased in proportion to man’s awareness of it.” – Albert Camus
“La liberté de fait ne s’est pas accrue proportionnellement à la conscience que l’homme en a prise.” (French)
“A nihilist is not someone who believes in nothing, but someone who does not believe in what he sees.” – Albert Camus
“Le nihiliste n’est pas celui qui ne croit à rien, mais celui qui ne croit pas à ce qui est.” (French)
“From the moment that man believes neither in God nor in immortal life, he becomes ‘responsible for everything alive, for everything that, born of suffering, is condemned to suffer from life.'” – Albert Camus
“À partir du moment où l’homme ne croit plus en Dieu, ni dans la vie immortelle, il devient « responsable de tout ce qui vit, de tout ce qui, né de la douleur, est voué à souffrir de la vie ».” (French)
“Atheism is humanism mediated by the suppression of religion, communism is humanism mediated by the suppression of private property.” – Albert Camus
“L’athéisme est l’humanisme médiatisé par la suppression de la religion, le communisme est l’humanisme médiatisé par la suppression de la propriété privée.” (French)
“It is not the nobility of rebellion which illuminates the world today, but nihilism.” – Albert Camus
“Ce n’est pas la révolte ni sa noblesse qui rayonnent aujourd’hui sur le monde, mais le nihilisme.” (French)
“It is not sufficient to live, there must be a destiny which does not have to wait on death. It is therefore justifiable to say that man has an idea of a better world than this. But better does not mean different, it means unified.” – Albert Camus
“Il ne suffit pas de vivre, il faut une destinée, et sans attendre la mort. Il est donc juste de dire que l’homme a l’idée d’un monde meilleur que celui-ci. Mais meilleur ne veut Pas dire alors différent, meilleur veut dire unifié.” (French)
“Morality has no faith in the world.” – Albert Camus
“La morale n’a pas foi au monde.” (French)
“When man submits God to moral judgment, he kills Him in his own heart.” – Albert Camus
“Dès l’instant où l’homme soumet Dieu au jugement moral, il le tue en lui-même.” (French)
“The world is divine because the world is illogical. That is why art alone, by being equally illogical, is capable of grasping it.” – Albert Camus
“Le monde est divin parce que le monde est gratuit. C’est pourquoi l’art seul, par son égale gratuité, est capable de l’appréhender.” (French)
“The blasphemy is reverent, since every blasphemy is, ultimately, a participation in holiness.” – Albert Camus
“Ce blasphème est révérencieux puisque tout blasphème, finalement, est participation au sacré.” (French)
“To say that life is absurd, the conscience must be alive.” – Albert Camus
“Pour, dire que la vie est absurde, la conscience a besoin d’être vivante.” (French)
“A creative period in art is determined by the order of a particular style applied to the disorder of a particular time. It gives form and formulae to contemporary passions.” – Albert Camus
“Une époque créatrice en art se définit par l’ordre d’un style appliqué au désordre d’un temps. Elle met en forme et en formules les passions des contemporains.” (French)
“Morality, when it is formal, devours.” – Albert Camus
“La morale , quand elle est formelle , dévore.” (French)