Quote

Take here the grand secret if not of pleasing all, yet of displeasing none, and court mediocrity, avoid originality, and sacrifice to fashion.

Johann Kaspar Lavater

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Johann Kaspar Lavater
Age: 59 †
Born: 1741
Born: November 15
Died: 1801
Died: January 2
Criminologist
Illustrator
Painter
Philosopher
Poet
Theologian
Writer
City of Zurich
Johann Caspar Lavater
J. C. Lavater
j. c. lavater
Sacrifice
Displeasing
Clothes
Pleasing
Fashion
Originality
Secret
Mediocrity
Take
Grand
Avoid
None
Court

More quotes by Johann Kaspar Lavater

Image
Defeat serves to enlighten us.
Johann Kaspar Lavater
Image
All finery is a sign of littleness.
Johann Kaspar Lavater
Image
The greatest of characters, no doubt, would be he, who, free of all trifling accidental helps, could see objects through one grand immutable medium, always at hand, and proof against illusion and time, reflecting every object in its true shape and colour through all the fluctuation of things.
Johann Kaspar Lavater
Image
Who trades in contradictions will not be contradicted.
Johann Kaspar Lavater
Image
You may depend upon it that he is a good man whose intimate friends are all good, and whose enemies are decidedly bad.
Johann Kaspar Lavater
Image
If you see one cold and vehement at the same time, set him down for a fanatic.
Johann Kaspar Lavater
Image
And still, laughter is akin to weeping.
Johann Kaspar Lavater
Image
He who seldom speaks, and with one calm well-timed word can strike dumb the loquacious, is a genius or a hero.
Johann Kaspar Lavater
Image
Who has witnessed one free and unconstrained act of yours, has witnessed all.
Johann Kaspar Lavater
Image
True love, like the eye, can bear no flaw.
Johann Kaspar Lavater
Image
A gift--its kind, its value and appearance the silence or the pomp that attends it the style in which it reaches you--may decide the dignity or vulgarity of the giver.
Johann Kaspar Lavater
Image
Women are proverbially credulous.
Johann Kaspar Lavater
Image
He who sedulously attends, pointedly asks, calmly speaks, coolly answers and ceases when he has no more to say is in possession of some of the best requisites of man
Johann Kaspar Lavater
Image
Thinkers are as scarce as gold.
Johann Kaspar Lavater
Image
He submits himself to be seen through a microscope, who suffers himself to be caught in a fit of passion.
Johann Kaspar Lavater
Image
Whatever obscurities may involve religious tenets, humility and love constitute the essence of true religion the humble is formed to adore, the loving to associate with eternal love.
Johann Kaspar Lavater
Image
Learn the value of a man's words and expressions, and you know him. Each man has a measure of his own for everything this he offers you inadvertently in his words. He who has a superlative for everything wants a measure for the great or small.
Johann Kaspar Lavater
Image
A beautiful smile is to the female countenance what the sunbeam is to the landscape it embellishes an inferior face and redeems an ugly one.
Johann Kaspar Lavater
Image
He whom common, gross, or stale objects allure, and when obtained, content, is a vulgar being, incapable of greatness in thought or action.
Johann Kaspar Lavater
Image
Kiss the hand of him who can renounce what he has publicly taught when convicted of his error, and who, with heartfelt joy, embraces truth, though with the sacrifice of favourite opinions.
Johann Kaspar Lavater