Share
×
Inspirational Quotes
Authors
Professions
Topics
Tags
Quote
Men never desire anything very eagerly which they desire only by the dictates of reason.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
Share
Change background
T
T
T
Change font
Original
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
Never
Men
Eagerly
Dictates
Passion
Desire
Anything
Reason
More quotes by Francois de La Rochefoucauld
The surest proof of being endowed with noble qualities is to be free from envy.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
If one judges love by the majority of its effects, it is more like hatred than like friendship.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
One is never fortunate or as unfortunate as one imagines.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
As we grow older we grow both more foolish and wiser at the same time.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
A certain harmony should be kept between actions and ideas if we want to fully develop the effects they can produce.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
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
A lofty mind always thinks nobly, it easily creates vivid, agreeable, and natural fancies, places them in their best light, clothes them with all appropriate adornments, studies others' tastes, and clears away from its own thoughts all that is useless and disagreeable.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
All women are flirts, but some are restrained by shyness, and others by sense.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
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.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
A man may be sharper than another, but not than all others.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
In all aspects of life, we take on a part and an appearance to seem to be what we wish to be--and thus the world is merely composed of actors.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
Sincerity is an openness of heart we find it in very few people what we usually see is only an artful dissimulation to win the confidence of others.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
There are few people who are more often in the wrong than those who cannot endure to be so.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
The health of the soul is something we can be no more sure of than that of the body and though a man may seem far from the passions, yet he is in as much danger of falling into them as one in a perfect state of health of having a fit of sickness.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
It is sometimes necessary to play the fool to avoid being deceived by cunning men.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
The most violent passions sometimes leave us at rest, but vanity agitates us constantly.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
The health of the soul is as precarious as that of the body for when we seem secure from passions, we are no less in danger of their infection than we are of falling ill when we appear to be well.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
Cunning and treachery proceed from want of capacity.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
Marriage is the only war in which you sleep with the enemy.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
Perseverance is neither praiseworthy nor blameworthy for it seems to be only the enduring of certain inclinations and opinions which men neither give themselves nor take away from themselves.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
