La Rochefoucauld Quotes

The man that thinks he loves his mistress for her own sake is mightily mistaken.

Quarrels would not last long if the fault was only on one side.

In friendship as well as love, ignorance very often contributes more to our happiness than knowledge.

Men give away nothing so liberally as their advice.

When our vices leave us, we like to imagine it is we who are leaving them.

We are so accustomed to disguise ourselves to others that in the end we become disguised to ourselves.

Our greediness so often troubles us, making us run after so many things at the same time, that while we too eagerly look after the least we miss the greatest.

Gratitude is merely the secret hope of further favors.

When the heart is still disturbed by the relics of a passion it is proner to take up a new one than when wholly cured.

Passion very often makes the wisest men fools, and very often too inspires the greatest fools with wit.

We always like those who admire us.

Pride does not wish to owe and vanity does not wish to pay.

How deceitful hope may be, yet she carries us on pleasantly to the end of life.

We cannot possibly imagine the variety of contradictions in every heart.

When we disclaim praise, it is only showing our desire to be praised a second time.

Youth is a perpetual intoxication; it is a fever of the mind.

The force we use on ourselves, to prevent ourselves from loving, is often more cruel than the severest treatment at the hands of one loved.

None deserve praise for being good who have not the spirit to be bad: goodness, for the most part, is nothing but indolence or weakness of will.

Nothing is so contagious as example.

As one grows older, one becomes wiser and more foolish.

If a man doesn't find ease in himself, 'tis in vain to seek it elsewhere.

Jealousy is nothing more than a fear of abandonment

True eloquence consists in saying all that should be said, and that only.

Humility is often a false front we employ to gain power over others.

Wisdom is the mind what health is to the body.

The world more often rewards the appearances of merit than merit itself.

Flattery is a counterfeit money which, but for vanity, would have no circulation.

The only real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes. The glory of great men should always be measured by the means they have used to acpuire it.

Weak people cannot be sincere.

What is perfectly true is perfectly witty.

The intellect is always fooled by the heart.

Passion makes idiots of the cleverest men, and makes the biggest idiots clever.

The sure mark of one born with noble qualities is being born without envy.

We rarely ever perceive others as being sensible, except for those who agree with us.

The constancy of sages is nothing but the art of locking up their agitation in their hearts.

A man's worth has its season, like fruit.

The art of putting into play mediocre qualities often begets more reputation than is achieved by true merit.

It is easier to appear worthy of a position one does not hold, than of the office which one fills.

Envy is destroyed by true friendship, as coquetry by true love.

The constancy of the wise is only the talent of concealing the agitation of their hearts.

The sure way to be cheated is to think one's self more cunning than others.

The old begin to complain of the conduct of the young when they themselves are no longer able to set a bad example.

When our hatred is violent, it sinks us even beneath those we hate.

Sometimes in life situations develop that only the half-crazy can get out of.

Thinkers think and doers do. But until the thinkers do and the doers think, progress will be just another word in the already overburdened vocabulary by sense.

To know how to hide one's ability is great skill.

As great minds have the faculty of saying a great deal in a few words, so lesser minds have a talent of talking much, and saying nothing.

There is many a virtuous woman weary of her trade.

We speak little if not egged on by vanity.

Familiarity is a suspension of almost all the laws of civility, which libertinism has introduced into society under the notion of ease.