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Selfishness is the grand moving principle of nine-tenths of our actions.
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
Principles
Moving
Tenths
Action
Selfishness
Grand
Motive
Principle
Nine
Actions
More quotes by Francois de La Rochefoucauld
It is not expedient or wise to examine our friends too closely few persons are raised in our esteem by a close examination.
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However greatly we distrust the sincerity of those we converse with, yet still we think they tell more truth to us than to anyone else.
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Our concern for the loss of our friends is not always from a sense of their worth, but rather of our own need of them and that we have lost some who had a good opinion of us.
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Honest people will respect us for our merit: the public, for our luck.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
History never embraces more than a small part of reality
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As we grow older, we increase in folly--and in wisdom.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
The first lover is kept a long while, when no offer is made of a second.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
All women are flirts, but some are restrained by shyness, and others by sense.
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Some disguised deceits counterfeit truth so perfectly that not to be taken in by them would be an error of judgment.
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To know how to hide one's ability is great skill.
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The confidence which we have in ourselves give birth to much of that, which we have in others.
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Gratitude, in most men, is only a strong and secret hope of greater favors.
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Though nature be ever so generous, yet can she not make a hero alone. Fortune must contribute her part too and till both concur, the work cannot be perfected.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
The qualities we have do not make us so ridiculous as those which we affect to have. [Fr., On n'est jamais si ridicule par les qualites que l'on a que par celles que l'on affecte d'avoir.]
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
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
When our hatred is violent, it sinks us even beneath those we hate.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
We are more interested in making others believe we are happy than in trying to be happy ourselves.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
Considering how little the beginning or the ceasing to love is in our own power, it is foolish and unreasonable for the lover or his mistress to complain of one another's inconstancy.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
In friendship as well as love, ignorance very often contributes more to our happiness than knowledge.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
Clemency, which we make a virtue of, proceeds sometimes from vanity, sometimes from indolence, often from fear, and almost always from a mixture of all three.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
