Quotes from Francois de La Rochefoucauld

Silence is the safest course for any man to adopt who distrust himself.

The happiness and misery of men depend no less on temper than fortune.

When we exaggerate our friends tenderness towards us, it is often less from gratitude than from a desire to exhibit our own virtue.

Jealousy lives upon doubts. It becomes madness or ceases entirely as soon as we pass from doubt to certainty.

It is great cleverness to know when to conceal ones cleverness.

Too great cleverness is but deceptive delicacy, true delicacy is the most substantial cleverness.

If we resist our passions, it is more through their weakness than from our strength

Before we set our hearts too much upon anything, let us examine how happy those are who already possess it.

Few are agreeable in conversation, because each thinks of what he intends to say than of what others are saying, and listens no more when he himself has a chance to speak.

Few things are impracticable in themselves; and it is for want of application, rather than of means, that men fail to succeed.

He who lives without folly is not so wise as he imagines.

He who lives without folly isn't so wise as he thinks.

Hypocrisy is the homage which vice pays to virtue.

Jealousy feeds upon suspicion, and it turns into fury or it ends as soon as we pass from suspicion to certainty.

Minds of moderate caliber ordinarily condemn everything which is beyond their range.

Nothing is less sincere than our mode of asking and giving advice. He who asks seems to have a deference for the opinion of his friend, while he only aims to get approval of his own and make his friend responsible for his action. And he who gives advice repays the confidence supposed to be placed in him by a seemingly disinterested zeal, while he seldom means anything by his advice but his own interest or reputation.

Preserving health by too severe a rule is a worrisome malady.

Small minds are much distressed by little things. Great minds see them all but are not upset by them.

The confidence which we have in ourselves gives birth to much of that which we have in others.

The defects of the understanding, like those of the face, grow worse as we grow old.

The glory of great men should always be measured by the means they have used to acquire it.

The height of cleverness is to be able to conceal it.

The pleasure of love is in loving.

The truest mark of being born with great qualities, is being born without envy.