Top 200 Baltasar Gracián Quotes (2025 Update)
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151. “A prudent man will think more important what fate has conceded to him, than what it has denied.”

— Baltasar Gracián

152. “The wise are always impatient, for he that increases knowledge increases impatience of folly.”

— Baltasar Gracián

153. “Deceit comes in through the ears, but usually leaves through the eyes.”

— Baltasar Gracián

154. “Even knowledge has to be in the fashion, and where it is not, it is wise to affect ignorance.”

— Baltasar Gracián

155. “Never do anything when you are in a temper, for you will do everything wrong.”

— Baltasar Gracián

156. “To equal a predecessor, one must have twice they worth.”

— Baltasar Gracián

157. “Mediocrity obtains more with application than superiority without it.”

— Baltasar Gracián

158. “Beauty and folly are generally companions.”

— Baltasar Gracián

159. “Folly consists not in committing Folly, but in being incapable of concealing it. All men make mistakes, but the wise conceal the blunders they have made, while fools make them public. Reputation depends more on what is hidden than on what is seen. If you can’t be good, be careful.”

— Baltasar Gracián

160. “Truth is for the minority.”

— Baltasar Gracián

161. “The wise person finds enemies more useful than the fool does friends .”

— Baltasar Gracián

162. “Fortunate people often have very favorable beginnings and very tragic endings. What matters isn’t being applauded when you arrive – for that is common – but being missed when you leave.”

— Baltasar Gracián

163. “Never participate in the secrets of those above you; you think you share the fruit, and you share the stones – the confidence of a prince is not a grant, but a tax.”

— Baltasar Gracián

164. “It is a great deed to leave nothing for tomorrow.”

— Baltasar Gracián

165. “If to talk to oneself when alone is folly, it must be doubly unwise to listen to oneself in the presence of others.”

— Baltasar Gracián

166. “Many get the repute of being witty but thereby lose the credit of being sensible. Jest has its little hour, seriousness should have all the rest.”

— Baltasar Gracián

167. “Fortune soon tires of carrying anyone long on her shoulders.”

— Baltasar Gracián

168. “Tis by no means the least of life’s rules: To let things alone.”

— Baltasar Gracián

169. “All victories breed, and that over your superior is foolish or fatal.”

— Baltasar Gracián

170. “Honorable beginnings should serve to awaken curiosity, not to heighten people’s expectations. We are much better off when reality surpasses our expectations, and something turns out better than we thought it would.”

— Baltasar Gracián

171. “Superiority is always detested.”

— Baltasar Gracián

172. “Courtesy is the politic witchery of great personages.”

— Baltasar Gracián

173. “No one demands more caution than a spy, and when someone has the skeleton key to minds, counter him by leaving the key of caution inside, on the other side of the keyhole.”

— Baltasar Gracián

174. “The great art of giving consists in this the gift should cost very little and yet be greatly coveted, so that it may be the more highly appreciated.”

— Baltasar Gracián

175. “Maturity is the slowness in which a man believes.”

— Baltasar Gracián

176. “Luck can be assisted. It is not all chance with the wise.”

— Baltasar Gracián

177. “Peacemakers not only live, they rule life.”

— Baltasar Gracián

178. “Begin with another’s to end with your own.”

— Baltasar Gracián

179. “Nature often lets us down when we most need her; let us turn to art.”

— Baltasar Gracián

180. “You should avoid making yourself too clear even in your explanations.”

— Baltasar Gracián

181. “Harness the imagination, for she is the whole of happiness.”

— Baltasar Gracián

182. “The truest wild beasts live in the most populous places.”

— Baltasar Gracián

183. “The worthless usually live long.”

— Baltasar Gracián

184. “The passions are the humors of the mind, and the least excess sickens our judgment. If the disease spreads to the mouth, your reputation will be in danger.”

— Baltasar Gracián

185. “One who was adored by all in prosperity is abhorred by all in adversity.”

— Baltasar Gracián

186. “Chance has something to say in everything, even how to write a good letter.”

— Baltasar Gracián

187. “The best remedy for disturbances is to let them run their course, for so they quiet down.”

— Baltasar Gracián

188. “The happy are an exception who enjoy innocently their simple happiness.”

— Baltasar Gracián

189. “To be at ease is better than to be at business.”

— Baltasar Gracián

190. “Sometimes it proves the highest understanding not to understand.”

— Baltasar Gracián

191. “Things do not pass for what they are, but for what they seem. Most things are judged by their jackets.”

— Baltasar Gracián

192. “Make your friends your teachers and mingle the pleasures of conversation with the advantages of instruction.”

— Baltasar Gracián

193. “Know how to choose well. Most of life depends thereon. It needs good taste and correct judgment, for which neither intellect nor study suffices.”

— Baltasar Gracián

194. “He that can live alone resembles the brute beast in nothing, the sage in much, and God in everything.”

— Baltasar Gracián

195. “It is better to have too much courtesy than too little, provided you are not equally courteous to all, for that would be injustice.”

— Baltasar Gracián

196. “It takes more to make one sage today than it did to make the seven of Greece. And you need more resources to deal with a single person these days than with an entire nation in times past.”

— Baltasar Gracián

197. “Every fool stands convinced; and everyone convinced is a fool. The faultier a person’s judgement the firmer their convictions.”

— Baltasar Gracián

198. “He who laughs at everything is as big a fool as he who weeps at everything.”

— Baltasar Gracián

199. “Few are the friends of a mans self, most those of his circumstances.”

— Baltasar Gracián

200. “There is none who cannot teach somebody something, and there is none so excellent but he is excelled.”

— Baltasar Gracián