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Making a book is a craft, like making a clock it needs more than native wit to be an author.

Jean de la Bruyere

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Jean de la Bruyere
Age: 50 †
Born: 1645
Born: August 16
Died: 1696
Died: May 10
Aphorist
Essayist
French Moralist
Lawyer
Philosopher
Translator
Writer
Paris
France
Jean de La Bruyere
Making
Book
Needs
Craft
Like
Wit
Crafts
Author
Native
Clock

More quotes by Jean de la Bruyere

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Profound ignorance makes a man dogmatic. The man who knows nothing thinks he is teaching others what he has just learned himself the man who knows a great deal can't imagine that what he is saying is not common knowledge, and speaks more indifferently.
Jean de la Bruyere
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The State not seldom tolerates a comparatively great evil to keep out millions of lesser ills and inconveniences which otherwise would be inevitable and without remedy.
Jean de la Bruyere
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In all conditions of life a poor man is a near neighbor to an honest one, and a rich man is as little removed from a knave.
Jean de la Bruyere
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Make me chaste and To what excesses will men not go for the sake of a religion in which they believe so little and which they practice so imperfectly!
Jean de la Bruyere
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Eloquence may be found in conversations and in all kinds of writings it is rarely found when looked for, and sometimes discovered where it is least expected.
Jean de la Bruyere
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Love seizes us suddenly, without giving warning, and our disposition or our weakness favors the surprise one look, one glance, from the fair fixes and determines us.
Jean de la Bruyere
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Extremes are vicious, and proceed from men compensation is just, and proceeds from God.
Jean de la Bruyere
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Mockery is often the result of a poverty of wit.
Jean de la Bruyere
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A prince wants only the pleasure of private life to complete his happiness.
Jean de la Bruyere
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A man without characteristics is a most insipid character.
Jean de la Bruyere
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Favor exalts a man above his equals, but his dismissal from that favor places him below them.
Jean de la Bruyere
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When a man puts on a Character he is a stranger to, there's as much difference between what he appears, and what he is really in himself, as there is between a VIzor and a Face.
Jean de la Bruyere
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He who can wait for what he desires takes the course not to be exceedingly grieved if he fails of it he, on the contrary, who labors after a thing too impatiently thinks the success when it comes is not a recompense equal to all the pains he has been at about it.
Jean de la Bruyere
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When we have run through all forms of government, without partiality to that we were born under, we are at a loss with which to side they are all a compound of good and evil. It is therefore most reasonable and safe to value that of our own country above all others, and to submit to it.
Jean de la Bruyere
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There is no excess in the world so commendable as excessive gratitude.
Jean de la Bruyere
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The art of conversation consists far less in displaying much wit oneself than in helping others to be witty: the man who leaves your company pleased with himself and his own wit is very well pleased with you.
Jean de la Bruyere
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All confidence placed in another is dangerous if it is not perfect, for on almost all occasions we ought to tell everything or to conceal everything. We have already told too much of our secret, if one single circumstance is to be kept back.
Jean de la Bruyere
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It is in vain to ridicule a rich fool, for the laughers will be on his side.
Jean de la Bruyere
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People reveal their character even in the simplest things they do. Fools do not enter a room, nor leave it, nor sit down, nor rise, nor are they silent, nor do they stand up, like people of sense and understanding.
Jean de la Bruyere
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It takes talent to please the people in a sermon by a flowery style, a cheerful ethic, brilliant sallies and lively descriptions but such a talent is inadequate. A better sort of talent neglects these extraneous ornaments, unworthy to be used in the service of the Gospel: such a preacher's sermon will be simple, strong and Christian.
Jean de la Bruyere