Quotations From DUC DE LA ROCHEFOUCAULD, FRANÇOIS

» More about Duc De La Rochefoucauld, François on Poemhunter

• 41.

  To praise princes for virtues which they have not, is to insult them with impunity.

  François, Duc De La Rochefoucauld (1613-1680), French writer, moralist. repr. F.A. Stokes Co., New York (c. 1930). Moral Maxims and Reflections, no. 320 (1665-1678), trans. London (1706).
• 42.

  Old people love to give good advice to console themselves for no longer being able to set a bad example.

  François, Duc De La Rochefoucauld (1613-1680), French writer, moralist. Sentences et Maximes Morales, no. 93 (1678).
  
  Read more quotations about / on: people, love
• 43.

  Generally speaking, we would make a good bargain by renouncing all the good that people say of us, upon condition they would say no ill.

  François, Duc De La Rochefoucauld (1613-1680), French writer, moralist. repr. F.A. Stokes Co., New York (c. 1930). Moral Maxims and Reflections, no. 454 (1665-1678), trans. London (1706).
  
  Read more quotations about / on: people
• 44.

  The clemency of princes is very often only a state-trick, to gain upon the affections of their subjects.

  François, Duc De La Rochefoucauld (1613-1680), French writer, moralist. repr. F.A. Stokes Co., New York (c. 1930). Moral Maxims and Reflections, no. 16 (1665-1678), trans. London (1706).
• 45.

  People's personalities, like buildings, have various facades, some pleasant to view, some not.

  François, Duc De La Rochefoucauld (1613-1680), French writer, moralist. repr. F.A. Stokes Co., New York (c. 1930). Moral Maxims and Reflections, no. 292 (1665-1678), trans. London (1706).
  
  Read more quotations about / on: people
• 46.

  True love is like ghosts, which everyone talks about but few have seen.

  François, Duc De La Rochefoucauld (1613-1680), French writer, moralist. Sentences et Maximes Morales, no. 76 (1678).
  
  Read more quotations about / on: love
• 47.

  Those who are incapable of commiting great crimes will not easily suspect others of doing so.

  François, Duc De La Rochefoucauld (1613-1680), French writer, moralist. Sentences et Maximes Morales, no. 592 (1665, ed. FitzGibbon, 1957). Samuel Johnson reiterated the remark in a letter, May 6, 1755, quoted in James Boswell, Life of Samuel Johnson (1791): "Men do not suspect faults which they do not commit."
• 48.

  Treachery is more often the effect of weakness than of a formed design.

  François, Duc De La Rochefoucauld (1613-1680), French writer, moralist. repr. F.A. Stokes Co., New York (c. 1930). Moral Maxims and Reflections, no. 121 (1665-1678), trans. London (1706).
• 49.

  As great minds have the faculty of saying a great deal in a few words, so lesser minds have a talent of talking much, and saying nothing.

  François, Duc De La Rochefoucauld (1613-1680), French writer, moralist. repr. F.A. Stokes Co., New York (c. 1930). Moral Maxims and Reflections, no. 143 (1665-1678), trans. London (1706).
• 50.

  No men are oftener wrong than those that can least bear to be so.

  François, Duc De La Rochefoucauld (1613-1680), French writer, moralist. repr. F.A. Stokes Co., New York (c. 1930). Moral Maxims and Reflections, no. 385 (1665-1678), trans. London (1706).