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Politeness is a desire to be treated politely, and to be esteemed polite oneself.

Francois de La Rochefoucauld

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Francois de La Rochefoucauld
Age: 66 †
Born: 1613
Born: September 15
Died: 1680
Died: March 17
Memoirist
Military Personnel
Writer
Paris
France
François VI
Duc de La Rochefoucauld
Prince de Marcillac
François
Duc de La Rochefoucauld
Desire
Politely
Esteemed
Politeness
Polite
Treated
Oneself

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Too great cleverness is but deceptive delicacy, true delicacy is the most substantial cleverness.
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Tis more dishonourable to distrust a friend than to be deceived by him.
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It is only persons of firmness that can have real gentleness. Those who appear gentle are, in general, only a weak character, which easily changes into asperity.
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Perfect courage is to do without witnesses what one would be capable of doing with the world looking on.
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A man for whom accident discovers sense, is not a rational being. A man only is so who understands, who distinguishes, who tests it.
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A readiness to believe ill of others, before we have duly examined it, is the effect of laziness and pride. We are eager to find aculprit, and loath to give ourselves the trouble of examining the crime.
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What makes us so bitter against people who outwit us is that they think themselves cleverer than we are.
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The man that thinks he loves his mistress for her own sake is mightily mistaken.
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There are heroes of wickedness, as there are of goodness.
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There are many predicaments in life that one must be a bit crazy to escape from.
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People are often vain of their passions, even of the worst, but envy is a passion so timid and shame-faced that no one ever dare avow her.
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Customary use of artifice is the sign of a small mind, and it almost always happens that he who uses it to cover one spot uncovers himself in another.
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Mediocre minds usually dismiss anything which reaches beyond their own understanding.
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A man would rather say evil of himself than say nothing.
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One forgives to the degree that one loves.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
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Happy people rarely correct their faults they consider themselves vindicated, since fortune endorses their evil ways.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
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We sometimes think that we hate flattery, but we only hate the manner in which it is done. [Fr., On croit quelquefoir hair la flatterie maid on ne hait que a maniere de flatter.]
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
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The contempt of riches in philosophers was only a hidden desire to avenge their merit upon the injustice of fortune, by despising the very goods of which fortune had deprived them it was a secret to guard themselves against the degradation of poverty, it was a back way by which to arrive at that distinction which they could not gain by riches.
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There is only one kind of love, but there are a thousand imitations.
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The heart of man ever finds a constant succession of passions, so that the destroying and pulling down of one proves generally tobe nothing else but the production and the setting up of another.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld