Top 1115 Quotes & Sayings by Francois de La Rochefoucauld - Page 2
Explore popular quotes and sayings by a French writer Francois de La Rochefoucauld.
Last updated on November 25, 2024.
When we are in love we often doubt that which we most believe.
A wise man thinks it more advantageous not to join the battle than to win.
It is almost always a fault of one who loves not to realize when he ceases to be loved.
Virtue would go far if vanity did not keep it company.
What is called generosity is usually only the vanity of giving; we enjoy the vanity more than the thing given.
How can we expect another to keep our secret if we have been unable to keep it ourselves?
Old people love to give good advice; it compensates them for their inability to set a bad example.
People that are conceited of their own merit take pride in being unfortunate, that themselves and others may think them considerable enough to be the envy and the mark of fortune.
Ridicule dishonors a man more than dishonor does.
Confidence contributes more to conversation than wit.
Gracefulness is to the body what understanding is to the mind.
What makes the pain we feel from shame and jealousy so cutting is that vanity can give us no assistance in bearing them.
The surest way to be deceived is to consider oneself cleverer than others.
Decency is the least of all laws, but yet it is the law which is most strictly observed.
We are more often treacherous through weakness than through calculation.
It is great folly to wish to be wise all alone.
Why can we remember the tiniest detail that has happened to us, and not remember how many times we have told it to the same person.
Love can no more continue without a constant motion than fire can; and when once you take hope and fear away, you take from it its very life and being.
It is from a weakness and smallness of mind that men are opinionated; and we are very loath to believe what we are not able to comprehend.
He who lives without folly isn't so wise as he thinks.
Men give away nothing so liberally as their advice.
The happiness and misery of men depend no less on temper than fortune.
The moderation of people in prosperity is the effect of a smooth and composed temper, owing to the calm of their good fortune.
They that apply themselves to trifling matters commonly become incapable of great ones.
Repentance is not so much remorse for what we have done as the fear of the consequences.
Heat of blood makes young people change their inclinations often, and habit makes old ones keep to theirs a great while.
The man that thinks he loves his mistress for her own sake is mightily mistaken.
We say little, when vanity does not make us speak.
We pardon to the extent that we love.
However glorious an action in itself, it ought not to pass for great if it be not the effect of wisdom and intention.
We always love those who admire us, but we do not always love those whom we admire.
Taste may change, but inclination never.
There are various sorts of curiosity; one is from interest, which makes us desire to know that which may be useful to us; and the other, from pride which comes from the wish to know what others are ignorant of.
There are bad people who would be less dangerous if they were quite devoid of goodness.
Our virtues are often, in reality, no better than vices disguised.
The sure mark of one born with noble qualities is being born without envy.
Only the contemptible fear contempt.
Old men are fond of giving good advice to console themselves for their inability to give bad examples.
Pride does not wish to owe and vanity does not wish to pay.
There are few virtuous women who are not bored with their trade.
You can find women who have never had an affair, but it is hard to find a woman who has had just one.
We are all strong enough to bear other men's misfortunes.
The more one loves a mistress, the more one is ready to hate her.
Weakness of character is the only defect which cannot be amended.
If we have not peace within ourselves, it is in vain to seek it from outward sources.
Perfect courage is to do without witnesses what one would be capable of doing with the world looking on.
We give advice, but we cannot give the wisdom to profit by it.
The passions are the only orators which always persuade.
Nature seems at each man's birth to have marked out the bounds of his virtues and vices, and to have determined how good or how wicked that man shall be capable of being.
However greatly we distrust the sincerity of those we converse with, yet still we think they tell more truth to us than to anyone else.
If we judge love by most of its effects, it resembles rather hatred than affection.
If we resist our passions, it is more due to their weakness than our strength.
Though nature be ever so generous, yet can she not make a hero alone. Fortune must contribute her part too; and till both concur, the work cannot be perfected.
Why is it that our memory is good enough to retain the least triviality that happens to us, and yet not good enough to recollect how often we have told it to the same person?
There is no better proof of a man's being truly good than his desiring to be constantly under the observation of good men.
Mediocre minds usually dismiss anything which reaches beyond their own understanding.
We are more interested in making others believe we are happy than in trying to be happy ourselves.
We seldom find people ungrateful so long as it is thought we can serve them.
What we call generosity is for the most part only the vanity of giving; and we exercise it because we are more fond of that vanity than of the thing we give.
Nothing hinders a thing from being natural so much as the straining ourselves to make it seem so.
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