Baltasar Gracian
Baltasar Gracian
Baltasar Gracián y Morales, SJ, formerly Anglicized as Baltazar Gracian, was a Spanish Jesuit and baroque prose writer and philosopher. He was born in Belmonte, near Calatayud. His writings were lauded by Schopenhauer and Nietzsche...
NationalitySpanish
ProfessionPhilosopher
Date of Birth8 January 1601
CountrySpain
friendship real-friends advice
Never have a companion that casts you in the shade.
winning shining advice
Display startling novelty-rise afresh like the sun every day. Change too the scene on which you shine, so that you rloss may be felt in the old scenes of your triumph, while the novelty of your powers wins applause in the new.
perfect advice upbraid
None is so perfect that he does not need at times the advice of others.
winning advice luck
Leave your luck while still winning.
wise advice easy
A wise prince must never take things easy in times of peace.
light advice forgotten
When you counsel someone, you should appear to be reminding him of something he had forgotten, not of the light he was unable to see.
wise thanking-him advice
The wise persono would rather see others needing him than thanking him.
smart people advice
Know how to use evasion. That is how smart people get out of difficulties.
expectations advice promise
Keep expectation alive. Keep stirring it up. Let much promise more, and great deeds herald greater.
man spanish-philosopher
At 20 a man is a peacock, at 30 a lion, at 40 a camel, at 50 a serpent, at 60 a dog, at 70 an ape, and at 80 nothing.
argument opponent side taken wrong
Don't take the wrong side in an argument just because your opponent has taken the right side
conquered courage difficulty joking later yields
Like love, courage is no joking matter. If it yields once, it will have to yield again, and again. The same difficulty will have to be conquered later on, and it would have been better to get it over with.
duration favors fortune intensity pays
Fortune pays sometimes for the intensity of her favors by the shortness of their duration
integrity done shows
They make the greatest show of what they have done, who have done least.