A Quote by Francois de La Rochefoucauld

Great souls are not those who have fewer passions and more virtues than others, but only those who have greater designs. — © Francois de La Rochefoucauld
Great souls are not those who have fewer passions and more virtues than others, but only those who have greater designs.
Maybe there are only three kinds of stories: those we live, those we tell, and those that help our souls fly upwards to a greater life.
It is a mistake to imagine, that the violent passions only, such as ambition and love, can triumph over the rest. Idleness, languid as it is, often masters them all; she influences all our designs and actions, and insensibly consumes and destroys both passions and virtues.
Nothing is more unjust, however common, than to charge with hypocrisy him that expresses zeal for those virtues which he neglects to practice; since he may be sincerely convinced of the advantages of conquering his passions without having yet obtained the victory as a man may be confident of the advantages of a voyage or a journey, without having courage or industry to undertake it, and may honestly recommend to others those attempts which he neglects himself.
In general, we should be able to agree that those who have greater opportunities and face fewer impediments have a greater responsibility to do more to help achieve such ends.
Investing intelligently in those of us who are marginalised means fewer people in jail, fewer homeless, fewer unemployed, fewer of us who are forlorn and depressed, fewer people addicted to things that drag us down... Because as we invest in those that do it tough, we will see more Australians taking pride in themselves, having realisable dreams and aspirations and making their own positive contribution to the world's greatest nation.
We pray for those who have ceased to pray. We pray for those that need prayer more than ever, that have fewer and fewer seasons even of thought, that grow hard with years, that are less and less troubled by sin, and that are more and more irreverent of religion. We pray for the children of Christian parents who sometimes weep at the memory of father and mother, but who never have thought of God.
All things are possible to those who believe, less difficult to those who hope, more easy to those who love, and still easier to those who persevere in the practice of these three virtues.
Pablo Casals is a very great artist. What I admire is the firm stand he has taken not only against the oppressors of his countrymen, but also against those opportunists who are always ready to compromise with the Devil. He perceives clearly that the world is in greater peril from those who tolerate or encourage evil than from those who actually commit it.
Suffering raises up those souls that are truly great; it is only small souls that are made mean-spirited by it.
The paradox is really the pathos of intellectual life and just as only great souls are exposed to passions it is only the great thinker who is exposed to what I call paradoxes, which are nothing else than grandiose thoughts in embryo.
Those who satisfy the wants of a smaller number of people only collect fewer votes-dollars-than those who satisfy the wants of more people.
Great passions are for the great of soul, and great events can be seen only by those who are on a level with them
Secrecy is the soul of all great designs. Perhaps more has been effected by concealing our own intentions than by discovering those of our enemy.
The average person puts only 25% of his energy and ability into his work. The world takes off its hat to those who put in more than 50% of their capacity, and stands on its head for those few and far between souls who devote 100%.
Do not be vexed with those who show pride, or malice, effeminacy, and impatience in their intercourse with you, or others, but , remembering that you yourself are subject to the same and greater sins and passions, pray for them and be meek with them.
Many pundits today are in the habit of misquoting Santayana's epigram, Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it. Maybe some people have come to grief this way, but they are probably fewer than those who have fallen into the opposite error. One is apt to perish in politics from too much memory, Tocqueville wrote somewhere, with equal truth and greater insight.
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