Good advice is something a man gives when he is too old to set a bad example.
– Francois de La Rochefoucauld
The height of ability consists in a thorough knowledge of the real value of things, and of the genius of the age in which we live.
– François de La Rochefoucauld
All women are flirts, but some are restrained by shyness, and others by sense.
– Francois de La Rochefoucauld
Marriage is the only war in which you sleep with the enemy.
– François de La Rochefoucauld
No persons are more frequently wrong, than those who will not admit they are wrong.
– Francois de La Rochefoucauld
Pride does not wish to owe and vanity does not wish to pay.
– François de La Rochefoucauld
What is called generosity is usually only the vanity of giving; we enjoy the vanity more than the thing given.
– Francois de La Rochefoucauld
Hypocrisy is a tribute that vice pays to virtue.
– Francois de La Rochefoucauld
We never listen when we are eager to speak.
– Francois de La Rochefoucauld
Innocence does not find near so much protection as guilt.
– François de La Rochefoucauld
The truest mark of being born with great qualities is being born without envy.
– François de La Rochefoucauld
When we cannot find contentment in ourselves, it is useless to seek it elsewhere.
– Francois de La Rochefoucauld
Jealousy lives upon doubts. It becomes madness or ceases entirely as soon as we pass from doubt to certainty.
– Francois de La Rochefoucauld
We promise according to our hopes and perform according to our fears.
– Francois de La Rochefoucauld
A true friend is the greatest of all blessings, and that which we take the least care of all to acquire.
– Francois de La Rochefoucauld
What makes the vanity of others insupportable is that it wounds our own.
– Francois de La Rochefoucauld
Few people have the wisdom to prefer the criticism that would do them good, to the praise that deceives them.
– Francois de La Rochefoucauld
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.
– Francois de La Rochefoucauld
Mediocre minds usually dismiss anything which reaches beyond their own understanding.
– François de La Rochefoucauld
The truest way to be deceived is to think oneself more knowing than others.
– Francois de La Rochefoucauld
As one grows older, one becomes wiser and more foolish.
– François de La Rochefoucauld
There is only one kind of love, but there are a thousand different versions.
– Francois de La Rochefoucauld
We should not judge of a man’s merit by his great abilities, but by the use he makes of them.
– Francois de La Rochefoucauld
It is a great ability to be able to conceal one’s ability.
– François de La Rochefoucauld
Virtue would not go to such lengths if vanity did not keep her company.
– Francois de La Rochefoucauld
It is easier to be wise for others than for ourselves.
– Francois de La Rochefoucauld
Of all our faults, the one that we excuse most easily is idleness.
– Francois de La Rochefoucauld
One cannot answer for his courage when he has never been in danger.
– Francois de La Rochefoucauld
We are nearer loving those who hate us, than those who love us more than we desire.
– Francois de La Rochefoucauld
Jealousy is always born with love, but does not always die with it.
– Francois de La Rochefoucauld
In love we often doubt what we most believe.
– Francois de La Rochefoucauld
If we had no faults we should not take so much pleasure in noting those of others.
– Francois de La Rochefoucauld
There are bad people who would be less dangerous if they were quite devoid of goodness.
– Francois de La Rochefoucauld
Gratitude is merely the secret hope of further favors.
– Francois de La Rochefoucauld
True love is like ghosts, which everybody talks about and few have seen.
– Francois de La Rochefoucauld
We often forgive those who bore us, but we do not forgive those we bore.
– Francois de La Rochefoucauld
Philosophy triumphs easily over past evils and future evils; but present evils triumph over it.
– Francois de La Rochefoucauld
Our envy always lasts longer than the happiness of those we envy.
– Francois de La Rochefoucauld
We speak little if not egged on by vanity.
– François de La Rochefoucauld
A man who finds no satisfaction in himself will seek for it in vain elsewhere.
– François de La Rochefoucauld
The shame that arises from praise which we do not deserve often makes us do things we should otherwise never have attempted.
– François de La Rochefoucauld
Self-interest makes some people blind, and others sharp-sighted.
– Francois de La Rochefoucauld
In jealousy there is more self-love than love.
– Francois de La Rochefoucauld
Listening well and answering well is one of the greatest perfections that can be obtained in conversation.
– Francois de La Rochefoucauld
All passions make us commit faults, but love makes us commit the most ridiculous ones.
– Francois de La Rochefoucauld
If we did not flatter ourselves, the flattery of others could never harm us.
– Francois de La Rochefoucauld
There are few things we should keenly desire if we really knew what we wanted.
– Francois de La Rochefoucauld
Imagination could never invent the number of different contradictions that exist innately in each person’s heart.
– Francois de La Rochefoucauld