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Francois de La Rochefoucauld

100 quotes

François de La Rochefoucauld (1613–1680) was a French moralist and author of *Maxims*, a collection of pithy observations about human behavior and society. His sharp, often cynical reflections on vanity, self-interest, and the gap between appearance and reality remain strikingly relevant centuries later.

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“As great minds have the faculty of saying a great deal in a few words, so lesser minds have a talent of talking much, and saying nothing.”

— Francois de La Rochefoucauld

Great

All Quotes by Francois de La Rochefoucauld

“It is with an old love as it is with old age a man lives to all the miseries, but is dead to all the pleasures.”

— Francois de La Rochefoucauld

Age

“There are few virtuous women who are not bored with their trade.”

— Francois de La Rochefoucauld

Women

“There is no better proof of a man's being truly good than his desiring to be constantly under the observation of good men.”

— Francois de La Rochefoucauld

Men

“What men have called friendship is only a social arrangement, a mutual adjustment of interests, an interchange of services given and received it is, in sum, simply a business from which those involved propose to derive a steady profit for their own self-love.”

— Francois de La Rochefoucauld

Business

“However rare true love may be, it is less so than true friendship.”

— Francois de La Rochefoucauld

Friendship

“It is not in the power of even the most crafty dissimulation to conceal love long, where it really is, nor to counterfeit it long where it is not.”

— Francois de La Rochefoucauld

Love

“We all have enough strength to endure the misfortunes of others.”

— Francois de La Rochefoucauld

Strength

“Few things are impracticable in themselves and it is for want of application, rather than of means, that men fail to succeed.”

— Francois de La Rochefoucauld

Men

“As it is the characteristic of great wits to say much in few words, so small wits seem to have the gift of speaking much and saying nothing.”

— Francois de La Rochefoucauld

Great

“One forgives to the degree that one loves.”

— Francois de La Rochefoucauld

Forgiveness

“What seems to be generosity is often no more than disguised ambition, which overlooks a small interest in order to secure a great one.”

— Francois de La Rochefoucauld

Great

“One can find women who have never had one love affair, but it is rare indeed to find any who have had only one.”

— Francois de La Rochefoucauld

Women

“You can find women who have never had an affair, but it is hard to find a woman who has had just one.”

— Francois de La Rochefoucauld

Women

“We should often blush for our very best actions, if the world did but see all the motives upon which they were done.”

— Francois de La Rochefoucauld

Best

“The defects of the mind, like those of the face, grow worse with age.”

— Francois de La Rochefoucauld

Age

“It is not enough to have great qualities We should also have the management of them.”

— Francois de La Rochefoucauld

Great

“It is from a weakness and smallness of mind that men are opinionated and we are very loath to believe what we are not able to comprehend.”

— Francois de La Rochefoucauld

Men

“True love is like ghosts, which everyone talks about and few have seen.”

— Francois de La Rochefoucauld

Love

“Only the contemptible fear contempt.”

— Francois de La Rochefoucauld

Fear

“Taste may change, but inclination never.”

— Francois de La Rochefoucauld

Change