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Penetration has an air of divination it pleases our vanity more than any other quality of the mind.
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
Divination
Penetration
Pleases
Vanity
Air
Please
Quality
Mind
More quotes by Francois de La Rochefoucauld
We often select envenomed praise which, by a reaction upon those we praise, shows faults we could not have shown by other means.
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When our vices leave us, we like to imagine it is we who are leaving them.
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Love can no more continue without a constant motion than fire can and when once you take hope and fear away, you take from it its very life and being.
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Humility is often merely feigned submissiveness assumed in order to subject others, an artifice of pride which stoops to conquer, and although pride has a thousand ways of transforming itself it is never so well disguised and able to take people in as when masquerading as humility.
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Weakness of character is the only defect which cannot be amended.
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A certain harmony should be kept between actions and ideas if we want to fully develop the effects they can produce.
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One man may be more cunning than another, but no one can be more cunning than all the world.
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Our repentances are generally not so much a concern and remorse for the harm we have done, as a fear of the harm we may have brought upon ourselves.
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As it is the characteristic of great wits to say much in few words, so small wits seem to have the gift of speaking much and saying nothing.
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All who know their own minds know not their own hearts.
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Humility is often a false front we employ to gain power over others.
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There are some good marriages, but practically no delightful ones.
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When a man is in love, he doubts, very often, what he most firmly believes.
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The desire which urges us to deserve praise strengthens our good qualities, and praise given to wit, valour, and beauty, tends to increase them.
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In the misfortunes of our best friends we always find something not altogether displeasing to us.
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Fortune and humor govern the world.
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Affected simplicity is a subtle imposture.
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The desire of appearing clever often prevents our becoming so.
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Vices are ingredients of virtues just as poisons are ingredients of remedies. Prudence mixes and tempers them and uses them effectively against life's ills.
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Most men expose themselves in battle enough to save their honor, few wish to do so more than sufficiently, or than is necessary to make the design for which they expose themselves succeed.
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