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 are more often treacherous through weakness than through calculation.
Philosophy triumphs easily over past evils and future evils, but present evils triumph over it.
Philosophy finds it an easy matter to vanquish past and future evils, but the present are commonly too hard for it.
Philosophy easily triumphs over past and future ills; but present ills triumph over philosophy.
It appears that nature has hid at the bottom of our hearts talents and abilities unknown to us. It is only the passions that have the power of bringing them to light, and sometimes give us views more true and more perfect than art could possibly do.
We confess our little faults to persuade people that we have no large ones.
We should often blush for our very best actions, if the world did but see all the motives upon which they were done.
When we are in love we often doubt that which we most believe.
We often pardon those that annoy us, but we cannot pardon those we annoy.
How is it that we remember the least triviality that happens to us, and yet not remember how often we have recounted it to the same person?
The word virtue is as useful to self-interest as the vices.
A man is sometimes as different from himself as he is from others.
Old men are fond of giving good advice to console themselves for their inability to give bad examples.
We are strong enough to bear the misfortunes of others.