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We need to be just before we are generous, as we need shirts before ruffles.

Nicolas Chamfort

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Nicolas Chamfort
Age: 53 †
Born: 1741
Born: April 6
Died: 1794
Died: April 13
Journalist
Philosopher
Playwright
Poet
Politician
Writer
Clarmont-Ferrand
Need
Needs
Ruffles
Shirts
Generosity
Generous

More quotes by Nicolas Chamfort

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It is inconceivable how much wit it requires to avoid being ridiculous.
Nicolas Chamfort
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There is as much expression in the feet as in the hands.
Nicolas Chamfort
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Scandal is an importunate wasp, against which we must make no movement unless we are quite sure that we can kill it otherwise it will return to the attack more furious than ever.
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Vivre est un maladie dont le sommeil nous soulage toutes les 16 heures. C'est un pallatif. La mort est le remede.
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The contact of two epidermises.
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It is among uneducated women that we may look for the most confirmed gossips. Goethe tells us there is nothing more frightful than bustling ignorance.
Nicolas Chamfort
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Almost the whole of history is but a sequence of horrors.
Nicolas Chamfort
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She commands who is blest with indifference.
Nicolas Chamfort
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Most books today seemed to have been written overnight from books read the day before.
Nicolas Chamfort
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Knowledge is boundless,--human capacity, limited.
Nicolas Chamfort
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Marriage follows on love as smoke on flame.
Nicolas Chamfort
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Spero Speroni explains admirably how an author who writes very clearly for himself is often obscure to his readers. It is, he says, because the author proceeds from the thought to the expression, and the reader from the expression to the thought.
Nicolas Chamfort
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Nearly all men are slaves for the same reason that the Spartans assigned for the servitude of the Persians -- lack of power to pronounce the syllable, No. To be able to utter that word and live alone, are the only means to preserve one's freedom and one's character.
Nicolas Chamfort
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Most of those who make collections of verse or epigram are like men eating cherries or oysters: they choose out the best at first, and end by eating all.
Nicolas Chamfort
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Where violence reigns, reason is weak.
Nicolas Chamfort
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The majority of the books of our time give one the impression of having been manufactured in a day out of books read the day before.
Nicolas Chamfort
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The best philosophical attitude to adopt towards the world is a union of the sarcasm of gaiety with the indulgence of contempt.
Nicolas Chamfort
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To possess a good cognomen is a long way on the road of success in life.
Nicolas Chamfort
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We leave unmolested those who set the fire to the house, and prosecute those who sound the alarm.
Nicolas Chamfort
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And so I leave this world, where the heart must either break or turn to lead (suicide note)
Nicolas Chamfort