La Rochefoucauld Maxims

La Rochefoucauld, John Heard

• Publisher: Dover Publications
• Year: 2012
• Print ISBN: 9780486451459
• eBook ISBN: 9780486137445
• Topic: Philosophy
• Subtopic: Social Philosophy

After abandoning politics when he was about forty, François, duc de La Rochefoucauld (1613-1680) began to write down his maxims, which were first published in book form in 1665. Poetic, ironic, and frequently humorous, his wise observations can also be blunt and brutally candid:
Everyone blames his memory, no one his judgment.
Gratitude is merely the secret hope of further favors.
It is often merely for an excuse that we say things are
impossible
We rarely think people have good sense unless they agree with us.
The more than 500 brief musings included here make for entertaining and thought-provoking reading. This invaluable collection will also serve as a sourcebook for writers, speakers, or anyone who needs a quick quip.

MAXIMS

1.

VIRTUES, as we call them, are often a series of acts and interests which chance, or our own diligence, has arranged. Men are not always brave because courageous, nor women chaste because virtuous.

2.

Vanity out-flatters the subtlest flatterer.

3.

Explore as we may within the boundaries of our self-esteem, there remain undiscovered regions.

4.

Conceit is more subtle than the most finished courtier.

5.

We are no more masters of the duration of our passions than of the length of our days.

6.

Passion often makes idiots of the wisest men, and clever men of fools.

7.

Historians would have us believe that the most dazzling deeds are the results of deep-laid plans; more often they are the results of men’s moods and passions. Thus, the war that Augustus waged against Antony, caused, we are told, by their ambition to be masters of the world, was, perchance, but the outcome of jealousy.

8.

Enthusiasm is the only convincing orator; it is like the infallible rule of some function of Nature. An enthusiastic simpleton is more persuasive than a silver-tongued orator.

9.

Our passions are so governed by injustice and self-interest that they are dangerous guides; suspect them most when they appear most logical.

10.

In the human heart one generation of passions follows another; from the ashes of one springs the spark of the next.

11.

One passion is often the parent of its antithesis; avarice gives birth to prodigality; prodigality to avarice; we are often firm because weak, or bold because timid.

12.

However artfully we cloak our passions with piety and honor, the veil is yet transparent.

13.

Egotism tolerates less kindly the censure of our tastes than that of our judgment.

14.

Men not only forget benefits and injuries; they hate those toward whom they are under an obligation and cringe to those who have insulted them. Gratitude and revenge, as duties, are yokes that gall.

15.

The magnanimity of princes is often but a policy to gain the love of their people.

16.

Clemency, usually counted a virtue, is occasionally the outcome of vanity, sometimes of laziness, often of fear, and usually of all three.

17.

Prosperity accounts for the content of the fortunate.

18.

Self-control is a dread of that scorn and envy which people, overcome by their own happiness, deserve. It is a vain display of our moral strength. Self-control, in a word, is the desire of most successful men to appear greater than their achievements.

19.

We all have strength to bear our neighbor’s burden.

20.

The quiescence of the sage is but the art of masking his emotions.

21.

A man condemned to die often affects a firmness and a scorn of death which, at bottom, are but his fear of facing it. And this stoicism is to his mind what the bandage is to his eyes.

22.

Philosophy easily masters past and future ills, but the sorrow of the moment is the master of philosophy.

23.

Few men have an intimate knowledge of death. We die not because of resignation, but from stupidity and custom, and most of us die because we cannot help it.

24.

Great men who succumb to misfortunes make it evident that they have borne their past troubles from ambition, not from courage. Except for their great vanity heroes are but ordinary men.

25.

It takes a better man to bear good luck than bad.

26.

Death and the sun! Who can outstare them?

27.

Often we boast of our most criminal passions, but envy is so mean and so sordid that we never admit it.

28.

Jealousy is in a measure justifiable; it is a defense of our own property, or of what we think is ours; whereas envy cannot tolerate another’s wealth.

29.

Our good qualities draw harsher criticism than our bad.

30.

Our strength exceeds our will-power; hence we often excuse our failures by pleading the impossibility of success.

31.

Had we no faults, we should not take such pleasure in discovering them in others.

32.

Jealousy thrives on doubt; certainty goads it to fury, or ends it.

33.

Pride is self-sufficient, and is unaffected though deprived of vanity.

34.

It is our own pride that blames our neighbor’s pride.

35.

The measure of pride is equal in all men; the difference lies in its manifestations.

36.

It seems that Nature, which has so wisely constructed our bodies for our welfare, gave us pride to spare us the painful knowledge of our short-comings.

37.

Pride plays a greater part than kindness in our censure of a neighbor’s faults. We criticise faults less to correct them, than to prove that we do not possess them.

38.

Promises are measured by hope; performances by fear.

39.

Egotism plays many parts, even that of altruism.

40.

Interest blinds some men, but lights the path of others.

41.

Undue attention to details tends to unfit us for greater enterprises.

42.

We are too weak to follow our best judgment.

43.

Man thinks he leads when he is ...

Table of contents

• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• Dedication
• THE MAN AND HIS OWN IMAGE
• SKETCH OF THE DUC DE LA ROCHEFOUCAULD
• MAXIMS