Of all kind of authors there are none I despise more than compilers, who search every where for shreds of other men's works, which they join to their own, like so many pieces of green turf in a garden: they are not at all superior to compositors in a printing house, who range the types, which, collected together, make a book, towards which they contribute nothing but the labours of the hand. I would have original writers respected, and it seems to me a kind of profanation to take those pieces from the sanctuary in which they reside, and to expose them to a contempt they do not deserve. When a man hath nothing new to say, why does not he hold his tongue? What business have we with this double employment?
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About Montesquieu
Montesquieu was a 17th-century French judge, historian, and political philosopher. Charles Louis de Secondat, baron de La Brède et de Montesquieu, generally referred to as simply Montesquieu, was a French judge, intellectual, historian, and political philosopher. Read more on Wikipedia →