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The whole genius of an author consists in describing well, and delineating character well. Homer, Plato, Virgil, Horace only excel other writers by their expressions and images we must indicate what is true if we mean to write naturally, forcibly and delicately.

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
Well
Images
Indicate
Whole
Writers
Excel
Must
Genius
Expressions
Mean
Expression
Describing
Virgil
Writing
Write
Plato
Forcibly
True
Consists
Horace
Character
Author
Delicately
Wells
Naturally
Homer

More quotes by 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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We are valued in this world at the rate we desire to be valued.
Jean de la Bruyere
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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.
Jean de la Bruyere
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It is worse to apprehend than to suffer.
Jean de la Bruyere
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An egotist will always speak of himself, either in praise or in censure, but a modest man ever shuns making himself the subject of his conversation.
Jean de la Bruyere
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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.
Jean de la Bruyere
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Children enjoy the present because they have neither a past nor a future.
Jean de la Bruyere
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The nearer we come to great men the more clearly we see that they are only men. They rarely seem great to their valets.
Jean de la Bruyere
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Logic is the art of making truth prevail.
Jean de la Bruyere
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Caprice in woman is the antidote to beauty.
Jean de la Bruyere
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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.
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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A man is rich whose income is larger than his expenses, and he is poor if his expenses are greater than his income.
Jean de la Bruyere
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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.
Jean de la Bruyere
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The flatterer does not think highly enough of himself or of others.
Jean de la Bruyere
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We never love with all our heart and all our soul but once, and that is the first time.
Jean de la Bruyere
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Hatred is so lasting and stubborn, that reconciliation on a sickbed certainly forebodes death.
Jean de la Bruyere
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It is no more in our power to love always than it was not to love at all.
Jean de la Bruyere
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Children are overbearing, supercilious, passionate, envious, inquisitive, egotistical, idle, fickle, timid, intemperate, liars, and dissemblers they laugh and weep easily, are excessive in their joys and sorrows, and that about the most trifling objects they bear no pain, but like to inflict it on others already they are men.
Jean de la Bruyere
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A man's worth is estimated in this world according to his conduct.
Jean de la Bruyere