Johann Kaspar Lavater Quotes
You may tell a man thou art a fiend, but not your nose wants blowing; to him alone who can bear a thing of that kind, you may tell all.
He is incapable of a truly good action who finds not a pleasure in contemplating the good actions of others.
He whom common, gross, or stale objects allure, and when obtained, content, is a vulgar being, incapable of greatness in thought or action.
Whatever obscurities may involve religious tenets, humility and love constitute the essence of true religion; the humble is formed to adore, the loving to associate with eternal love.
He who reforms himself has done more towards reforming the public than a crowd or noisy, impotent patriots.
Injustice arises either from precipitation, or indolence, or from a mixture of both. - The rapid and slow are seldom just; the unjust wait either not at all, or wait too long.
Who in the same given time can produce more than others has vigor; who can produce more and better, has talents; who can produce what none else can, has genius.
It is one of my favorite thoughts that God manifests Himself to men in all the wise, good, humble, generous, great, and magnanimous men.
Receive no satisfaction for premeditated impertinence - forget it, forgive it - but keep him inexorably at a distance who of∣fered it.
Faces are as legible as books, only with these circumstances to recommend them to our perusal, that they are read in much less time, and are much less likely to deceive us.
In the society of ladies, want of sense is not so unpardonable as want of manners.
I am prejudiced in favor of him who, without impudence, can ask boldly. He has faith in humanity, and faith in himself. No one who is not accustomed to giving grandly can ask nobly and with boldness.
He who, when called upon to speak a disagreeable truth, tells it boldly and has done is both bolder and milder than he who nibbles in a low voice and never ceases nibbling.
Just so far as we are pleased at finding faults, are we displeased at finding perfection.
Thinkers are scarce as gold; but he whose thoughts embrace all his subject, and who pursues it uninterruptedly and fearless of consequences, is a diamond of enormous size.
Certain trifling flaws sit as disgracefully on a character of elegance as a ragged button on a court dress.
All belief that does not make us more happy, more free, more loving, more active, more calm, is, I fear, a mistaken and superstitious belief.
A beautiful smile is to the female countenance what the sunbeam is to the landscape; it embellishes an inferior face and redeems an ugly one.
To realize that you were mistaken, is just the acknowledgement , that you are wiser today than you were yesterday.
True worth is as inevitably discovered by the facial expression, as its opposite is sure to be clearly represented there. The human face is nature's tablet, the truth is certainly written thereon.
Joy and grief decide character. What exalts prosperity? what imbitters grief? what leaves us indifferent? what interests us? As the interest of man, so his God - as his God, so he.
Who cuts is easily wounded. The readier you are to offend the sooner you are offended.
He who, in questions of right, virtue, or duty, sets himself above all ridicule, is truly great, and shall laugh in the end with truer mirth than ever he was laughed at.
Three days of uninterrupted company in a vehicle will make you better acquainted with another, than one hour's conversation with him every day for three years.
Let none turn over books, or roam the stars in quest of God, who sees him not in man.
The manner of giving shows the character of the giver, more than the gift itself.
The discovery of truth, by slow progressive meditation, is wisdom. - Intuition of truth, not preceded by perceptible meditation, is genius.
