Famous Quotes by François, Duc De La Rochefoucauld

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  • A man is never as fortunate—or as unfortunate—as he imagines. More
  • If we judge love by most of its effects, it resembles rather hatred than affection. More
  • What we take for virtue is often but an assemblage of various ambitions and activities that... More
  • A man is sometimes as different from himself as he is from others. More
  • We all have strength enough to bear the misfortunes of others. More
  • People always complain about their memories, never about their minds. More
  • You can find women who have never had an affair, but it is hard to find a woman who has had just... More
  • On neither the sun, nor death, can a man look fixedly. More
  • Hypocrisy is an homage that vice renders to virtue. More
  • There are a great many simpletons who know themselves to be so, and who make a very cunning use... More
  • When our vices leave us, we like to imagine it is we who are leaving them. More
  • There are but very few men clever enough to know all the mischief they do. More
  • There are good marriages, but no delightful ones. More
  • There are heroes of wickedness, as there are of goodness. More
  • There are people who would never have been in love, had they never heard love spoken of. More
  • There are several sorts of curiosity: a curiosity of self-interest, for example, which makes us... More
  • There are some faults which, when dexterously managed, make a brighter show than virtue itself. More
  • There are some people upon whom their very faults and failings sit gracefully; and there are... More
  • There are very few things impossible in themselves; and we do not want means to conquer... More
  • There are wicked men who would be much less dangerous if they had not some goodness. More
  • There is many a virtuous woman weary of her trade. More
  • He is not to pass for a man of reason who stumbles upon reason by chance—but he who knows it... More
  • There is a sort of love whose very excessiveness prevents the lover’s being jealous. More
  • There is an excess both in happiness and misery above our power of sensation. More
  • There is no accident so unfortunate but wise men will make some advantage of it, nor any so... More
  • There is no better proof of a man’s being truly good than his desiring to be constantly under... More
  • Even the most disinterested love is, after all, but a kind of bargain, in which self-love always... More
  • Self-interest makes some people blind, and others sharp-sighted. More
  • Self-interest speaks all sort of languages, and plays all sort of roles—even that of disinterest. More
  • Self-love has nowhere a greater share, nor is more predominant in any passion, than in that love;... More
  • Self-love is the greatest flatterer in the world. More
  • Every one complains of a poor memory, no one of a weak judgment. More
  • Self-love is the love of a man’s own self, and of everything else for his own sake. It makes... More
  • Self-love makes our friends appear more or less deserving in proportion to the delight we take in... More
  • There is nothing men are so generous of as advice. More
  • There is something to be said for jealousy, because it only designs the preservation of some good... More
  • Happiness does not consist in things themselves but in the relish we have of them; and a man has... More
  • They that apply themselves to trifling matters commonly become incapable of great ones. More
  • Things often offer themselves to our mind in a more finished form in the very first thought, than... More
  • Great men’s honor ought always to be measured by the methods they made use of in attaining it. More
  • Gravity is a kind of mystical behavior in the body, invented to conceal the defects of the mind. More
  • Gratitude among friends is like credit among tradesmen: it keeps business up, and maintains... More
  • Those great and glorious actions that dazzle our eyes with their luster are represented by... More
  • Those that have had great passions esteem themselves for the rest of their lives fortunate—and... More
  • Some accidents there are in life that a little folly is necessary to help us out of. More
  • Though men are apt to flatter and exalt themselves with their great achievements, yet these are,... More
  • Though nature be ever so generous, yet can she not make a hero alone. Fortune must contribute her... More
  • Generally speaking, we would make a good bargain by renouncing all the good that people say of... More
  • To praise princes for virtues which they have not, is to insult them with impunity. More
  • Silence is the best security to the man who distrusts himself. More
  • To think to be wise alone is a very great folly. More
  • Treachery is more often the effect of weakness than of a formed design. More
  • Tricks and treachery are the practice of fools that have not wit enough to be honest. More
  • True bravery means doing alone that which one could do if all the world were by. More
  • True friendship destroys envy, and true love destroys coquetterie. More
  • Truth has scarce done so much good in the world as the false appearances of it have done hurt. More
  • Sincerity is a certain openness of heart. It is to be found in very few, and what we commonly... More
  • Fortune mends more faults in us than ever reason would be able to do. More
  • Fortune makes our virtues and vices visible, just as light does the objects of sight. More
  • Unfaithfulness ought to extinguish love, and we should not be jealous when there is reason to be.... More
  • Fortune converts everything to the advantage of her favorites. More
  • When a man is in love, he doubts, very often, what he most firmly believes. More
  • Very few people are acquainted with death. They undergo it, commonly, not so much out of... More
  • Vices enter into the composition of virtues as poisons into the composition of certain medicines.... More
  • When a man must force himself to be faithful in his love, this is hardly better than unfaithfulness. More
  • Vices may be said to await us along the course of our lives like hosts with whom we lodge... More
  • Virtue would not make such advances if there were not a little vanity to keep it company. More
  • Virtues lose themselves in self-interest, as rivers in the sea. More
  • We always love those that admire us, but we do not always love those we admire. More
  • We are all strong enough to bear other men’s misfortunes. More
  • We are almost always bored with people it is not permissible to be bored with. More
  • We are easily comforted for the misfortunes of our friends, when those misfortunes give us an... More
  • We are much mistaken if we think that men are always brave from a principle of valor, or women... More
  • We are never either so fortunate or so misfortunate as we imagine. More
  • We are sensitive to good or ill fortune only in proportion to our self-love. More
  • We are so used to dissembling with others that in time we come to deceive and dissemble with... More
  • We are sometimes as different from ourselves as we are from others. More
  • We are very far from always knowing our own wishes. More
  • We come altogether fresh and raw into the several stages of life, and often find ourselves... More
  • We confess our faults that our sincerity might repair the harm those faults themselves have done... More
  • Few people have the wisdom to prefer the criticism that would do them good, to the praise that... More
  • We do not lack strength so much as the will to use it; and very often our imagining that things... More
  • We do not like to praise, and seldom praise anyone without self-interest. More
  • When the philosophers despised riches, it was because they had a mind to vindicate their own... More
  • We do not praise others, ordinarily, but in order to be praised ourselves. More
  • We easily forget our faults when no one knows them but ourselves. More
  • We easily forgive our friends those faults that do no affect us ourselves. More
  • We often are consoled by our want of reason for misfortunes that reason could not have comforted. More
  • We often brag that we are never bored with ourselves, and are so vain as never to think ourselves... More
  • We frequently are troublesome to others, when we think it impossible for us ever to be so. More
  • We have no patience with other people’s vanity because it is offensive to our own. More
  • We have not strength enough to follow our reason so far as it would carry us. More
  • When the soul is ruffled by the remains of one passion, it is more disposed to entertain a new... More
  • We may seem great in an employment below our worth, but we very often look little in one that is... More
  • We may sooner be brought to love them that hate us, than them that love us more than we would... More
  • We often in our misfortunes take that for constancy and patience which is only dejection of mind;... More
  • We often make use of envenomed praise, that reveals on the rebound, as it were, defects in those... More
  • We often pardon those that annoy us, but we cannot pardon those we annoy. More
  • We often see malefactors, when they are led to execution, put on resolution and a contempt of... More
  • We promise in proportion to our hopes, and we deliver in proportion to our fears. More
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