Nicolas Chamfort
Nicolas Chamfort
Sébastien-Roch Nicolas, also known as Chamfort, was a French writer, best known for his witty epigrams and aphorisms. He was secretary to Louis XVI's sister, and of the Jacobin club...
NationalityFrench
ProfessionWriter
Date of Birth6 April 1741
CountryFrance
character men enjoy
Many men and women enjoy popular esteem, not because they are known, but because they are not known.
acceptance
One must not hope to be more than one can be.
confidence love-you loving-yourself
If you must love your neighbor as yourself, it is at least as fair to love yourself as your neighbor.
funny morning time
Swallow a toad in the morning and you will encounter nothing more disgusting the rest of the day.
friendship
Women bestow on friendship only what they borrow from love.
women heart reflection
Men's hearts and faces are always wide asunder; women's are not only in close connection, but are mirror-like in the instant power of reflection.
wrinkles together made
Wrinkles and ill-nature together made a woman hideous.
color society chameleon
We take our colors, chameleon-like, from each other.
men small-changes quality
Too elevated qualities often unfit a man for society. We do not go to market with ingots, but with silver and small change.
slander
Slander is the balm of malignity.
self imperfection deny
Though we best know and cannot deny our imperfections, it is not for us to lose our self-reliance and true manhood.
life sleep sixteen
Life is a malady in which sleep soothes us every sixteen hours; it is a palliation; death is the remedy.
knowledge capacity humans
Knowledge is boundless,--human capacity, limited.
victory way spurs
Anticipation leads the way to victory, and is the spur to conquest.