Francois de La Rochefoucauld Quotations | Page 6

We often brag that we are never bored with ourselves, and are so vain as never to think ourselves bad company.

The reason why lovers are never bored together is that they are always talking of themselves.

The best way to rise in society is to use all possible means of persuading people that one has already risen in society.

When we seek reconciliation with our enemies, it is commonly out of a desire to better our own condition, a being harassed and tired out with a state of war, and a fear of some ill accident which we are willing to prevent.

The judgments our enemies make about us come nearer to the truth than those we make about ourselves.

Self-love is the love of a man's own self, and of everything else for his own sake. It makes people idolaters to themselves, and tyrants to all the world besides.

Treachery is more often the effect of weakness than of a formed design.

Great men's honor ought always to be measured by the methods they made use of in attaining it.

None but great men are capable of having great flaws.

Whatever pretended causes we may blame our afflictions upon, it is often nothing but self-interest and vanity that produce them.

Fortune makes our virtues and vices visible, just as light does the objects of sight.

Virtue would not make such advances if there were not a little vanity to keep it company.

Virtues lose themselves in self-interest, as rivers in the sea.

Some people are so extremely whiffling and inconsiderable that they are as far from any real faults as from substantial virtues.

Of all our faults, the one we avow most easily is idleness; we persuade ourselves that it is allied to all the peaceable virtues,and as for the others, that it does not destroy them utterly, but only suspends the exercise of their functions.

The older a fool is, the worse he is.

Men frequently do good only to give themselves opportunity of doing ill with impunity.

The appearances of goodness and merit often meet with a greater reward from the world than goodness and merit themselves.

It is easier for a man to be thought fit for an employment that he has not, than for one he stands already possessed of, and is exercising.

Our good qualities expose us more to hatred and persecution than all the ill we do.

The whimsicalness of our own humor is a thousand times more fickle and unaccountable than what we blame so much in fortune.

Fortune mends more faults in us than ever reason would be able to do.

We often are consoled by our want of reason for misfortunes that reason could not have comforted.

There are a great many simpletons who know themselves to be so, and who make a very cunning use of their own simplicity.

A weak mind is the only defect out of our power to mend.

Some good qualities are like the senses: Those who are entirely deprived of them can have no notion of them.

It is often hard to determine whether a clear, open, and honorable proceeding is the result of goodness or of cunning.

The exceeding delight we take in talking about ourselves should give us cause to fear that we are giving but very little pleasureto our listeners.

Some men are like ballads, that are in everyone's mouth a little while.

Affected simplicity is a subtle imposture.

A readiness to believe ill of others, before we have duly examined it, is the effect of laziness and pride. We are eager to find aculprit, and loath to give ourselves the trouble of examining the crime.

No one thinks fortune so blind as those she has been least kind to.

Moderation is a fear of falling into that envy and contempt which those who grow giddy with their good fortune quite justly draw upon themselves. It is a vain boasting of the greatness of our mind.

The moderation of men in the most exalted fortunes is a desire to be thought above those things that have raised them so high.

There is something to be said for jealousy, because it only designs the preservation of some good which we either have or think wehave a right to. But envy is a raging madness that cannot bear the wealth or fortune of others.

Some crimes get honor and renown by being committed with more pomp, by a greater number, and in a higher degree of wickedness thanothers. Hence it is that public robberies, plunderings, and sackings have been looked upon as excellencies and noble achievements, and the seizing of whole countries, however unjustly and barbarously, is dignified with the glorious name of gaining conquests.

It is sometimes a point of as much cleverness to know to make good use of advice from others as to be able give good advice to oneself.

One man may be more cunning than another, but no one can be more cunning than all the world.

We often in our misfortunes take that for constancy and patience which is only dejection of mind; we suffer without daring to holdup our heads, just as cowards let themselves be knocked on the head because they have not courage to strike back.

Perseverance is neither praiseworthy nor blameworthy; for it seems to be only the enduring of certain inclinations and opinions which men neither give themselves nor take away from themselves.

Avarice is more directly opposed to thrift than generosity is.

A wise man should order his interests, and set them all in their proper places. This order is often troubled by greed, which putsus upon pursuing so many things at once that, in eagerness for matters of less consideration, we grasp at trifles, and let go things of greater value.

Our repentances are generally not so much a concern and remorse for the harm we have done, as a fear of the harm we may have brought upon ourselves.

That which occasions so many mistakes in the computations of men, when they expect return for favors, is that the giver's pride and the receiver's cannot agree upon the value of the kindness done.

Envy is more incapable of reconciliation than hatred is.

We frequently are troublesome to others, when we think it impossible for us ever to be so.

The greatest part of our faults are more excusable than the methods that are commonly taken to conceal them.

The applause we give those who are new to society often proceeds from a secret envying of those already established.

A man seldom finds people unthankful, as long as he remains in a condition of benefiting them further.

Our own distrust gives a fair pretence for the knavery of other people.

The only thing that should astonish us is that anything can yet astonish us.

It is safer to do most men harm than to do them too much good.

A man is ridiculous less through the characteristics he has than through those he affects to have.

Commonplace minds usually condemn what is beyond the reach of their understanding.

Hope and fear are inseparable. There is no hope without fear, nor any fear without hope.

Some disguised deceits counterfeit truth so perfectly that not to be taken in by them would be an error of judgment.

We exaggerate the glory of some men in order to detract from that of others.

We are always bored by the very people by whom it is vital not to be bored.

Most men, like plants, possess hidden qualities which chance discovers.

Without humility, we keep all our defects; and they are only crusted over by pride, which conceals them from others, and often from ourselves.

It is easier to fall in love when you are out of it than to get out of it when you are in.

History never embraces more than a small part of reality

The man whom no one pleases is much more unhappy than the man who pleases no one.

We are never so generous as when giving advice.

Virtue is to the soul what health is tot he body.

Passion often makes a fool of the cleverest man and often makes the most foolish men clever

It is not always for virtue's sake that women are virtuous.

Our hopes, often though they deceive us, lead us pleasantly along the path of life.

In friendship, as in love, we are often more happy from the things we are ignorant of than from those we are acquainted with.

The truest comparison we can make of love is to liken it to a fever; we have no more power over the one than the other, either as to its violence or duration.

A man may be sharper than another, but not than all others.

A woman often thinks she regrets the lover, when she only regrets the love.

Absence abates a moderate passion and intensifies a great one - as the wind blows out a candle but fans fire into flame.

Consolation for unhappiness can often be found in a certain satisfaction we get from looking unhappy.

Few things are needful to make the wise man happy, but nothing satisfies the fool; - and this is the reason why so many of mankind are miserable.

He who refuses praise the first time that it is offered does so because he would hear it a second time.

Humility is often only a feigned submissiveness by which men hope to bring other people to submit to them; it is a more calculated sort of pride.

If you cannot find peace in yourself, it is useless to look for it elsewhere.

In their early passions women are in love with the lover, later they are in love with love.

It is harder to hide the feelings we have than to feign the ones we do not have.

Jealousy is always born with love, but does not die with it. In jealousy there is more of self-love than of love to another.

Love, like fire, cannot subsist without constant impulse; it ceases to live from the moment it ceases to hope or to fear.

Loyalty is in most people only a ruse used by self-interest to attract confidence.

One should treat one's fate as one does one's health; enjoy it when it is good, be patient with it when it is poor, and never attempt any drastic cure save as an ultimate resort.

Plenty of people want to be pious, but no one yearns to be humble.

Tricks and treachery are merely proofs of lack of skill.

We are eager to believe that others are flawed because we are eager to believe in what we wish for.

Gratitude is a lively sense of benefits to come.

There are many predicaments in life that one must be a bit crazy to escape from.

We confess to little faults only to persuade ourselves we have no great ones.

There are few people more convinced of their own genius than those who complain of how stupid they are.

Humility is the worst form of conceit.

It is not enough that we should succeed, but our friends must fail as well.

We should not be upset that others hide the truth from us, when we hide it so often from ourselves.

One kind of happiness is to know exactly at what point to be miserable.

When our hatred is too alive puts us below what we hate.

We should often blush at our noblest deeds if the world were to see all their underlying motives.

To know oneself is not necessarily to improve oneself

Men have written in the most convincing manner to prove that death is no evil, and this opinion has been confirmed on a thousand celebrated occasions by the weakest of men as well as by heroes. Even so I doubt whether any sensible person has ever believed it, and the trouble men take to convince others as well as themselves that they do shows clearly that it is no easy undertaking.

Only strong natures can really be sweet ones; those that seem sweet are in general only weak, and may easily turn sour.