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We should only endeavour to think and speak correctly ourselves, without wishing to bring others over to our taste and opinions.

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
Think
Opinions
Thinking
Taste
Bring
Opinion
Wish
Speak
Endeavour
Others
Wishing
Without
Correctly

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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.
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Misers are neither relations, nor friends, nor citizens, nor Christians, nor perhaps even human beings.
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For some people, speaking and giving offence are one and the same thing. They are spiteful and bitter their style is infused with gall and wormwood mockery, abuse and insults flow from their lips like spittle.
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We seldom repent talking little, but very often talking too much.
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A party spirit betrays the greatest men to act as meanly as the vulgar herd.
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When, after having read a work, loftier thoughts arise in your mind and noble and heartfelt feelings animate you, do not look for any other rule to judge it by it is fine and written in a masterly manner.
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It is boorish to live ungraciously: the giving is the hardest part what does it cost to add a smile?
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Caprice in woman is the antidote to beauty.
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An assembly of the states, a court of justice, shows nothing so serious and grave as a table of gamesters playing very high a melancholy solicitude clouds their looks envy and rancor agitate their minds while the meeting lasts, without regard to friendship, alliances, birth or distinctions.
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The opposite of what is noised about concerning men and things is often the truth. [Fr., Le contraire des bruits qui courent des affaires ou des personnes est souvent la verite.]
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The doctors allow one to die, the charlatans kill.
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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!
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We meet With few utterly dull and stupid souls: the sublime and transcendent are still fewer the generality of mankind stand between these two extremes: the interval is filled with multitudes of ordinary geniuses, but all very useful, and the ornaments and supports of the commonwealth.
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Praise, of all things, is the most powerful excitement to commendable actions, and animates us in our enterprises.
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There are but three events which concern man: birth, life and death. They are unconscious of their birth, they suffer when they die, and they neglect to live.
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It is more or less rude to scorn indiscriminately all kinds of praise we ought to be proud of that which comes from honest men, who praise sincerely those things in us which are really commendable.
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It is no more in our power to love always than it was not to love at all.
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Languages are the keys of science.
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There is a pleasure in meeting the glance of a person whom we have lately laid under some obligations.
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Grief that is dazed and speechless is out of fashion: the modern woman mourns her husband loudly and tells you the whole story of his death, which distresses her so much that she forgets not the slightest detail about it.
Jean de la Bruyere