1,221 Quotes by François de La Rochefoucauld

It is more often from pride than from ignorance that we are so obstinately opposed to current opinions; we find the first places taken, and we do not want to be the last.

To safeguard one's health at the cost of too strict a diet is a tiresome illness, indeed.

The qualities we have do not make us so ridiculous as those which we affect to have. [Fr., On n'est jamais si ridicule par les qualites que l'on a que par celles que l'on affecte d'avoir.]

Whatever pretext we may give for our affections, often it is only interest and vanity which cause them.

The greatest part of our faults are more excusable than the methods that are commonly taken to conceal them.

The same strength of character which helps a man resist love, helps to make it more violent and lasting too. People of unsettled minds are always driven about with passions, but never absolutely filled with any.

In most of mankind gratitude is merely a secret hope of further favors.

What keeps us from abandoning ourselves entirely to one vice, often, is the fact that we have several.

We do not wish ardently for what we desire only through reason.