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
expectations people each-day
Don't show off every day, or you'll stop surprising people. There must always be some novelty left over. The person who displays a little more of it each day keeps up expectations, and no one ever discovers the limits of his talent.
giving people want
You have to appear wiser and more prudent than is required by the people you are dealing with if you want to give a high opinion of yourself.
reality expectations people
Honorable beginnings should serve to awaken curiosity, not to heighten people's expectations. We are much better off when reality surpasses our expectations, and something turns out better than we thought it would.
thinking ideas people
Don't express your ideas too clearly. Most people think little of what they understand, and venerate what they do not.
success goal people
Take care to make things turn out well. Some people scruple more over pointing things in the right direction than over successfully reaching their goals. The disgrace of failure outweighs the diligence they showed. A winner is never asked for explanations.
wisdom people easier
Know how to ask. There is nothing more difficult for some people, nor for others, easier.
clever two people
Two kinds of people are good at foreseeing danger: those who have learned at their own expense, and the clever people who learn a great deal at the expense of others.
smart people advice
Know how to use evasion. That is how smart people get out of difficulties.
people busy
Many people who pretend to be very busy have the least to do.
what-matters people common
Fortunate people often have very favorable beginnings and very tragic endings. What matters isn't being applauded when you arrive - for that is common - but being missed when you leave.
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