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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.
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
Given
Wit
Good
Qualities
Praise
Increase
Deserve
Valour
Beauty
Strengthens
Quality
Tends
Desire
Urges
More quotes by Francois de La Rochefoucauld
The strongest symptom of wisdom in man is his being sensible of his own follies.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
Things often offer themselves to our mind in a more finished form in the very first thought, than we might have made them by muchart and study.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
To praise princes for virtues they do not possess is to insult them without fear of consequences.
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
Nothing is so contagious as example.
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.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
We sometimes condemn the present, by praising the past and show our contempt of what is now, by our esteem for what is no more.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
Some people are like popular songs that you only sing for a short time.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
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
Numberless arts appear foolish whose secret motives are most wise and weighty.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
One of the greatest and also the commonest of faults is for men to believe that, because they never hear their shortcomings spoken of, or read about them in cold print, others can have no knowledge of them. GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG, The Reflections of Lichtenberg We are often more agreeable through our faults than our good qualities.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
No men are oftener wrong than those that can least bear to be so.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
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.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
In order to succeed in the world people do their upmost to appear successful.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
The head does not know how to play the part of the heart for long.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
If it were not for the company of fools, a witty man would often be greatly at a loss.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
We have more indolence in the mind than in the body.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
Our probity is not less at the mercy of fortune than our property.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
What makes us so bitter against people who outwit us is that they think themselves cleverer than we are.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
We often make use of envenomed praise, that reveals on the rebound, as it were, defects in those praised which we dare not exposeany other way.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
