Francois de La Rochefoucauld
Francois de La Rochefoucauld
François VI, Duc de La Rochefoucauld, Prince de Marcillacla ʁɔʃfuˈko]; 15 September 1613 – 17 March 1680) was a noted French author of maxims and memoirs. It is said that his world-view was clear-eyed and urbane, and that he neither condemned human conduct nor sentimentally celebrated it. Born in Paris on the Rue des Petits Champs, at a time when the royal court was vacillating between aiding the nobility and threatening it, he was considered an exemplar of the accomplished 17th-century...
NationalityFrench
ProfessionWriter
Date of Birth15 September 1613
CountryFrance
We take less pains to be happy, than to appear so.
Misers mistake gold for their good; whereas 'tis only a means of attaining it.
Though most of the friendships of the world ill deserve the name of friendships; yet a man may make use of them on occasion, as of a traffic whose returns are uncertain, and in which 'tis usual to be cheated.
The better part of one's life consists of his friendships. ABRAHAM LINCOLN, letter to Joseph Gillespie, July 13, 1849 Friendship is insipid to those who have experienced love.
Tis more dishonourable to distrust a friend than to be deceived by him.
Fortune never seems so blind to any as to those on whom she bestows no favors.
Old fools are greater fools than young ones.
Only great men have great faults.
For envy, like lightning, generally strikes at the top Or any point which sticks out from the ordinary level. LUCRETIUS, De Rerum Natura Our envy always outlives the felicity of its object.
A resolution never to deceive exposes a man to be often deceived.
Those who have the most cunning affect all their lives to condemn cunning; that they may make use of it on some great occasion, and to some great end.
We easily forget crimes that are known to none but ourselves.
The ambitious deceive themselves in proposing an end to their ambition; that end, when attained, becomes a means.
Men may boast of their great actions; but they are more often the effects of chance than of design.