Quote

We love much better those who endeavor to imitate us, than those who strive to equal us. For imitation is a sign of esteem, but competition of envy.

Francois de La Rochefoucauld

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

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
Love
Envy
Esteem
Sign
Strive
Competition
Equal
Imitate
Better
Imitation
Much
Endeavor

More quotes by Francois de La Rochefoucauld

Image
What is called liberality is often merely the vanity of giving.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
Image
It is pointless for a woman to be young unless pretty, or to be pretty unless young.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
Image
A good woman is a hidden treasure who discovers her will do well not to boast about it.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
Image
In the misfortunes of our best friends we always find something not altogether displeasing to us.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
Image
The first lover is kept a long while, when no offer is made of a second.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
Image
Silence is the safest policy if you are unsure of yourself.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
Image
However wicked men may be, they do not dare openly to appear the enemies of virtue, and when they desire to persecute her they either pretend to believe her false or attribute crimes to her.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
Image
Many young persons believe themselves natural when they are only impolite and coarse.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
Image
However glorious an action in itself, it ought not to pass for great if it be not the effect of wisdom and intention.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
Image
We often bore others when we think we cannot possibly bore them.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
Image
True bravery means doing alone that which one could do if all the world were by.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
Image
Some people displease with merit, and others' very faults and defects are pleasing.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
Image
We would rather speak ill of ourselves than not talk about ourselves at all.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
Image
Women know not the whole of their coquetry.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
Image
A work can become modern only if it is first postmodern. Postmodernism thus understood is not modernism at its end but in the nascent state, and this state is constant.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
Image
Truth does less good in the world than its appearances do harm.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
Image
A man's wits are better employed in bearing up under the misfortunes that lie upon him at present than in foreseeing those that may come upon him hereafter.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
Image
Whatever discoveries we may have made in the regions of self-love, there still remain many unknown lands.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
Image
Those that have had great passions esteem themselves for the rest of their lives fortunate and unfortunate in being cured of them.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
Image
Sincerity is a certain openness of heart. It is to be found in very few, and what we commonly look upon to be so is only a cunningsort of dissimulation, to insinuate ourselves into the confidence of others.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld