Top 300 Jean de La Bruyère Quotes (2024 Update)
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101. “Love, slow and gradual in its growth, is too much like friendship ever to be a violent passion.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

102. “A guilty man is punished as an example for the mob; an innocent man convicted is the business of every honest citizen.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

103. “The most amiable people are those who least wound the self-love of others.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

104. “Love begins with love ; and the warmest friendship cannot change even to the coldest love.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

105. “Wit is the god of moments, but Genius is the god of ages.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

106. “A position of eminence makes a great person greater and a small person less.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

107. “Logic is the technique by which we add conviction to truth.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

108. “Discourtesy does not spring merely from one bad quality, but from several – from foolish vanity, from ignorance of what is due to others, from indolence, from stupidity, from distraction of thought, from contempt of others, from jealousy.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

109. “There are some sordid minds, formed of slime and filth, to whom interest and gain are what glory and virtue are to superior souls; they feel no other pleasure but to acquire money.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

110. “We come too late to say anything which has not been said already.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

111. “Children are contemptuous, haughty, irritable, envious, sneaky, selfish, lazy, flighty, timid, liars and hypocrites, quick to laugh and cry, extreme in expressing joy and sorrow, especially about trifles, they’ll do anything to avoid pain but they enjoy inflicting it: little men already.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

112. “False modesty is the masterpiece of vanity: showing the vain man in such an illusory light that he appears in the reputation of the virtue quite opposite to the vice which constitutes his real character; it is a deceit.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

113. “A man must have very eminent qualities to hold his own without being polite.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

114. “To speak and to offend is with some people but one and the same thing.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

115. “Women run to extremes, they are either better or worse than men.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

116. “There exist some evils so terrible and some misfortunes so horrible that we dare not think of them, whilst their very aspect makes us shudder; but if they happen to fall on us, we find ourselves stronger than we imagined, we grapple with our ill luck, and behave better than we expected we should.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

117. “The majority of women have no principles of their own; they are guided by the heart, and depend for their own conduct, upon that of the men they love.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

118. “A man can deceive a woman by his sham attachment to her provided he does not have a real attachment elsewhere.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

119. “Let us not complain against men because otheir rudeness, their ingratitude, their injustice, their arrogance, their love oself, their forgetfulness oothers. They are so made. Such is their nature.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

120. “Time makes friendship stronger, but love weaker.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

121. “One mark of a second-rate mind is to be always telling stories.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

122. “We trust our secrets to our friends, but they escape from us in love.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

123. “If it be true that a man is rich who wants nothing, a wise man is a very rich man.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

124. “The true spirit of conversation consists more in bringing out the cleverness of others than in showing a great deal of it yourself.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

125. “Laziness begat wearisomeness, and this put men in quest of diversions, play and company, on which however it is a constant attendant; he who works hard, has enough to do with himself otherwise.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

126. “If a secret is revealed, the person who has confided it to another is to be blamed.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

127. “Among some people arrogance supplies the place of grandeur, inhumanity of decision, and roguery of intelligence.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

128. “Grief that is dazed and speechless is out of fashion: the modern woman mourns her husband loudly and tells you the whole story of his death, which distresses her so much that she forgets not the slightest detail about it.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

129. “To endeavor to forget anyone is a certain way of thinking of nothing else.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

130. “The highest reach of a news-writer is an empty Reasoning on Policy, and vain Conjectures on the public Management.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

131. “A heap of epithets is poor praise: the praise lies in the facts, and in the way of telling them.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

132. “One faithful Friend is enough for a man’s self, ’tis much to meet with such an one, yet we can’t have too many for the sake of others.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

133. “The court is like a palace of marble; it’s composed of people very hard and very polished.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

134. “A simple garb is the proper costume of the vulgar; it is cut for them, and exactly suits their measure, but it is an ornament for those who have filled up their lives with great deeds. I liken them to beauty in dishabille, but more bewitching on that account.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

135. “A man must be very inert to have no character at all.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

136. “The pleasure a man of honor enjoys in the consciousness of having performed his duty is a reward he pays himself for all his pains.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

137. “No vice exists which does not pretend to be more or less like some virtue, and which does not take advantage of this assumed resemblance.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

138. “If a handsome woman allows that another woman is beautiful, we may safely conclude she excels her.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

139. “To how many girls has a great beauty been of no other use but to make them expect a large fortune!”

— Jean de La Bruyère

140. “We never love with all our heart and all our soul but once, and that is the first time.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

141. “We must confess that at present the rich predominate, but the future will be for the virtuous and ingenious.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

142. “The events we most desire do not happen; or, if they do, it is neither in the time nor in the circumstances when they would have given us extreme pleasure.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

143. “Some men promise to keep your secret and yet reveal it without knowing they are doing so; they do not wag their lips, and yet they are understood; it is read on their brow and in their eyes; it is seen through their breast; they are transparent.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

144. “A lofty birth or a large fortune portend merit, and cause it to be the sooner noticed.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

145. “All the worth of some people lies in their name; upon a closer inspection it dwindles to nothing, but from a distance it deceives us.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

146. “Nothing is easier for passion than to overcome reason, but the greatest triumph is to conquer a man’s own interests.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

147. “If you wish to be held in esteem, you must ssociate only with those who estimable.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

148. “The doctors allow one to die, the charlatans kill.”

— Jean de La Bruyère

149. “It is boorish to live ungraciously: the giving is the hardest part; what does it cost to add a smile?”

— Jean de La Bruyère

150. “It is too much for a husband to have a wife who is a coquette and sanctimonious as well; she should select only one of those qualities.”

— Jean de La Bruyère