Top 500 François de La Rochefoucauld Quotes (2025 Update)
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401. “Men would not live in society long if they were not each others dupes.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld

402. “The love of new acquaintance comes not so much from being weary of what we had before, or from any satisfaction there is in change, as from the distaste we feel in being too little admired by those that know us too well, and the hope of being more admired by those that know us less.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld

403. “Our distrust justifies the deceit of others.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld

404. “If a man doesn’t find ease in himself, ’tis in vain to seek it elsewhere.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld

405. “The virtues and vices are all put in motion by interest.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld

406. “Self-interest speaks all manner of tongues and plays all manner of parts, even that of disinterestedness.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld

407. “Youth changes its tastes by the warmth of its blood; age retains its tastes by habit.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld

408. “Those whom the world has delighted to honor have oftener been influenced in their doings by ambition and vanity than by patriotism.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld

409. “One honor won is a surety for more.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld

410. “We make promises to the extent that we hope-and keep them to the extent that we fear.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld

411. “The constancy of sages is nothing but the art of locking up their agitation in their hearts.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld

412. “Unfaithfulness ought to extinguish love, and we should not be jealous when there is reason to be. Only those who give no grounds for jealousy are worthy of it.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld

413. “Jealousy springs more from love of self than from love of another.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld

414. “There are few things we should keenly desire if we really knew what we wanted.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld

415. “The passions possess a certain injustice and self interest which makes it dangerous to follow them, and in reality we should distrust them even when they appear most trustworthy.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld

416. “It may be said that the vices await us in the journey of life like hosts with whom we must successively lodge; and I doubt whether experience would make us avoid them if we were to travel the same road a second time.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld

417. “If one judges love according to the greatest part of the effects it produces, it would appear to resemble rather hatred than kindness.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld

418. “Our aversion to lying is commonly a secret ambition to make what we say considerable, and have every word received with a religious respect.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld

419. “The violence we do to ourselves in order to remain faithful to the one we love is hardly better than an act of infidelity.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld

420. “Some good qualities are like the senses: Those who are entirely deprived of them can have no notion of them.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld

421. “Women do not know all their powers of flirtation.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld

422. “A man of understanding finds less difficulty in submitting to a wrong-headed fellow, than in attempting to set him right.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld

423. “The vivacity that augments with years is not far from folly.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld

424. “It is praiseworthy even to attempt a great action.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld

425. “We often brag that we are never bored with ourselves, and are so vain as never to think ourselves bad company.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld

426. “When our vices leave us, we like to imagine it is we who are leaving them.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld

427. “It is most difficult to speak when we are ashamed of being silent.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld

428. “We do not wish ardently for what we desire only through reason.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld

429. “Virtue would not make such advances if there were not a little vanity to keep it company.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld

430. “All men are equally proud. The only difference is that not all take the same methods of showing it.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld

431. “Sometimes we meet a fool with wit, never one with discretion.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld

432. “To establish yourself in the world a person must do all they can to appear already established.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld

433. “The dullness of certain people is sometimes a sufficient security against the attack of an artful man.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld

434. “That good disposition which boasts of being most tender is often stifled by the least urging of self-interest.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld

435. “There are several remedies which will cure love, but there are no infallible ones.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld

436. “Those that have had great passions esteem themselves for the rest of their lives fortunate and unfortunate in being cured of them.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld

437. “Eloquence: saying the proper thing and stopping.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld

438. “Nothing should lessen our satisfaction with ourselves as much as when we notice that we disapprove of something at one time that we approve of at another time.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld

439. “The intellect of the generality of women serves more to fortify their folly than their reason.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld

440. “The breeding we give young people is ordinarily but an additional self-love, by which we make them have a better opinion of themselves.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld

441. “The name and pretense of virtue is as serviceable to self-interest as are real vices.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld

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

— François de La Rochefoucauld

443. “The generality of men have, like plants, latent properties, which chance brings to light.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld

444. “All women seem by nature to be coquettes.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld

445. “Those who most obstinately oppose the most widely-held opinions more often do so because of pride than lack of intelligence. They find the best places in the right set already taken, and they do not want back seats.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld

446. “Novelty is to love like bloom to fruit; it gives a luster which is easily effaced, but never returns.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld

447. “We judge so superficially of things, that common words and actions spoke and done in an agreeable manner, with some knowledge of what passes in the world, often succeed beyond the greatest ability.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld

448. “Men are often so foolish as to boast and value themselves upon their passions, even those that are most vicious. But envy is a passion so full of cowardice and shame that no one every ever had the confidence to own it.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld

449. “We are always bored by the very people by whom it is vital not to be bored.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld

450. “Madmen and fools see everything through the medium of humor.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld