Top 300 Jean de La Bruyère Quotes (2024 Update)

1. “Those who make the worst use of their time are the first to complain of its brevity.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

2. “Out of difficulties grow miracles.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

3. “A person’s worth in this world is estimated according to the value he puts on himself.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

4. “Most men spend the first half of their lives making the second half miserable.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

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5. “No road is to long for him who advances slowly and does not hurry and no attainment is beyond his reach who equips himself with patience to achieve it.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

6. “Discretion is the perfection of reason, and a guide to us in all the duties of life. It is only found in men of sound sense and understanding.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

7. “The spendthrift robs his heirs the miser robs himself.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

8. “Logic is the art of convincing us some truth.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

9. “Mockery is often the result of a poverty of wit.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

10. “The most exquisite pleasure is giving pleasure to others.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

11. “Next to sound judgment, diamonds and pearls are the rarest things in the world.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

12. “The exact contrary of what is generally believed is often the truth.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

13. “A pious man is one who would be an atheist if the king were.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

14. “An egotist will always speak of himself, either in praise or in censure, but a modest man ever shuns making himself the subject of his conversation.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

15. “A man reveals his character even in the simplest things he does.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

16. “A man who knows the court is master of his gestures, of his eyes and of his face; he is profound, impenetratable; he dissimulates bad offices, smiles at his enemies, controls his irritation, disguises his passions, belies his heartm speaks and acts against his feelings.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

17. “The shortest and best way to make your fortune is to let people see clearly that it is in their interest to promote yours.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

18. “If poverty is the mother of all crimes, lack of intelligence is the father.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

19. “It is a great misfortune neither to have enough wit to talk well nor enough judgment to be silent.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

20. “False modesty is the refinement of vanity. It is a lie.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

21. “Incivility is not a Vice of the Soul, but the effect of several Vices; of Vanity, Ignorance of Duty, Laziness, Stupidity, Distraction, Contempt of others, and Jealousy.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

22. “Jesting is often only indigence of intellect.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

23. “All of our unhappiness comes from our inability to be alone.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

24. “It is a fool’s privilege to laugh at an intelligent man.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

25. “Men regret their life has been ill-spent, but this does not always induce them to make a better use of the time they have yet to live.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

26. “The regeneration of society is the regeneration of society by individual education.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

27. “Days, months, years fly away, and irrecoverably sink in the abyss of time.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

28. “The great charm of conversation consists less in the display of one’s own wit and intelligence than in the power to draw forth the resources of others.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

29. “We seldom repent talking little, but very often talking too much.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

30. “It is more or less rude to scorn indiscriminately all kinds of praise; we ought to be proud of that which comes from honest men, who praise sincerely those things in us which are really commendable.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

31. “There are three great events in our lives: birth, life and death. Of birth we have no conscience; with death, we suffer; and, concerning life, we forget to live it.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

32. “A great mind is above insults, injustice, grief, and raillery, and would be invulnerable were it not open to compassion.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

33. “How sweet, how passing sweet, is solitude!”

— Jean de La Bruyère

34. “Modesty is to merit, what shade is to figures in a picture; it gives it strength and makes it stand out.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

35. “Languages are the keys of science.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

36. “A modest man never talks of himself.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

37. “Banter is often a proof of want of intelligence.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

38. “There is no excess in the world so commendable as excessive gratitude.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

39. “Death happens but once, yet we feel it every moment of our lives; it is worse to dread it than to suffer it.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

40. “It’s motive alone which gives character to the actions of men.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

41. “Such a great misfortune, not to be able to be alone.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

42. “To express truth is to write naturally, forcibly, and delicately.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

43. “Profound ignorance makes a man dogmatic. The man who knows nothing thinks he is teaching others what he has just learned himself; the man who knows a great deal can’t imagine that what he is saying is not common knowledge, and speaks more indifferently.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

44. “There are some men who turn a deaf ear to reason and good advice, and willfully go wrong for fear of being controlled.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

45. “We must laugh before we are happy, for fear we die before we laugh at all.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

46. “A man is rich whose income is larger than his expenses, and he is poor if his expenses are greater than his income.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

47. “Cunning is none of the best nor worst qualities; it floats between virtue and vice; there is scarce any exigence where it may not, and perhaps ought not to be supplied by prudence.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

48. “Two persons cannot long be friends if they cannot forgive each other’s little failings.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

49. “A wise man is not governed by others, nor does he try to govern them; he prefers that reason alone prevail.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

50. “Pure friendship is something which men of an inferior intellect can never taste.”

— Jean de La Bruyère