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
People always complain about their memories, never about their minds.
It is almost always a fault of one who loves not to realize when he ceases to be loved.
Our aversion to lying is commonly a secret ambition to make what we say considerable, and have every word received with a religious respect.
Never give anyone the advice to buy or sell shares, because the most benevolent price of advice can turn out badly.
Most people know no other way of judging men's worth but by the vogue they are in, or the fortunes they have met with.
The principal point of cleverness is to know how to value things just as they deserve.
It is not enough to have great qualities; We should also have the management of them.
However greatly we distrust the sincerity of those we converse with, yet still we think they tell more truth to us than to anyone else.
It is often laziness and timidity that keep us within our duty while virtue gets all the credit.
It is a great act of cleverness to be able to conceal one's being clever.
The surest way to be deceived is to consider oneself cleverer than others.
Funeral pomp is more for the vanity of the living than for the honor of the dead.
Virtue would go far if vanity did not keep it company.
Flattery is a kind of bad money, to which our vanity gives us currency.