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 label judges with having the meanest motives, and yet we desire that our reputation and fame should depend upon the judgment of men, who are all, either from their jealousy or preoccupation or want of intelligence, opposed to us - and yet despite their bias, just for the sake of making these men decide in our favor, we peril in so many ways both our peace and our life.
We may give advice, but not the sense to use it.
The person giving the advice returns the confidence placed in him with a disinterested eagerness... and he is usually guided only by his own interest or reputation.
Sometimes there is equal or more ability in knowing how to use good advice than there is in giving it.
Honest people will respect us for our merit: the public, for our luck.
There are people who in spite of their merit disgust us and others who please us in spite of their faults.
There is great skill in knowing how to conceal one's skill.
We are inconsolable at being deceived by our enemies and being betrayed by our friends, yet we are often content in be being treated like that by our own selves.
The reason we bitterly hate those who deceive us is because they think they are cleverer than we are.
It is as easy to unknowingly deceive yourself as it is to deceive others.
A man convinced of his own merit will accept misfortune as an honor, for thus can he persuade others, as well as himself, that he is a worthy target for the arrows of fate.
The only good copies are those which make us see the absurdity of bad originals.
There are no events so disastrous that adroit men do not draw some advantage from them, nor any so fortunate that the imprudent cannot turn to their own prejudice.
Whilst weakness and timidity keep us to our duty, virtue has often all the honor.