It is almost always a fault of one who loves not to realize when he ceases to be loved.
— Francois de La Rochefoucauld
You can find women who have never had an affair, but it is hard to find a woman who has had just one.
It is a great act of cleverness to be able to conceal one's being clever.
As great minds have the faculty of saying a great deal in a few words, so lesser minds have a talent of talking much, and saying nothing.
Those that have had great passions esteem themselves for the rest of their lives fortunate and unfortunate in being cured of them.
The mind cannot long play the heart's role.
We are very far from always knowing our own wishes.
We may seem great in an employment below our worth, but we very often look little in one that is too big for us.
That good disposition which boasts of being most tender is often stifled by the least urging of self-interest.
Many men are contemptuous of riches; few can give them away.
Moderation is the feebleness and sloth of the soul, whereas ambition is the warmth and activity of it.
The surest way to be deceived is to consider oneself cleverer than others.
Politeness is a desire to be treated politely, and to be esteemed polite oneself.
The greatest part of intimate confidences proceed from a desire either to be pitied or admired.
Nothing hinders a thing from being natural so much as the straining ourselves to make it seem so.
A man is sometimes as different from himself as he is from others.
There are very few things impossible in themselves; and we do not want means to conquer difficulties so much as application and resolution in the use of means.
It is often laziness and timidity that keep us within our duty while virtue gets all the credit.
The man that thinks he loves his mistress for her own sake is mightily mistaken.
A man's worth has its season, like fruit.
It is not in the power of even the most crafty dissimulation to conceal love long, where it really is, nor to counterfeit it long where it is not.
We are easily comforted for the misfortunes of our friends, when those misfortunes give us an occasion of expressing our affection and solicitude.
However greatly we distrust the sincerity of those we converse with, yet still we think they tell more truth to us than to anyone else.
Some counterfeits reproduce so very well the truth that it would be a flaw of judgment not to be deceived by them.
Philosophy finds it an easy matter to vanquish past and future evils, but the present are commonly too hard for it.
The principal point of cleverness is to know how to value things just as they deserve.
When a man is in love, he doubts, very often, what he most firmly believes.
It is with an old love as it is with old age a man lives to all the miseries, but is dead to all the pleasures.
The more one loves a mistress, the more one is ready to hate her.
Innocence does not find near so much protection as guilt.
Women's virtue is frequently nothing but a regard to their own quiet and a tenderness for their reputation.
However glorious an action in itself, it ought not to pass for great if it be not the effect of wisdom and intention.
There is many a virtuous woman weary of her trade.
It is from a weakness and smallness of mind that men are opinionated; and we are very loath to believe what we are not able to comprehend.
The name and pretense of virtue is as serviceable to self-interest as are real vices.
One can find women who have never had one love affair, but it is rare indeed to find any who have had only one.
A great many men's gratitude is nothing but a secret desire to hook in more valuable kindnesses hereafter.
The desire of talking of ourselves, and showing those faults we do not mind having seen, makes up a good part of our sincerity.
Only the contemptible fear contempt.
Pride, which inspires us with so much envy, is sometimes of use toward the moderating of it too.
Self-interest makes some people blind, and others sharp-sighted.
We seldom praise anyone in good earnest, except such as admire us.
We are never so ridiculous through what we are as through what we pretend to be.
When a man must force himself to be faithful in his love, this is hardly better than unfaithfulness.
We promise in proportion to our hopes, and we deliver in proportion to our fears.
The accent of a man's native country remains in his mind and his heart, as it does in his speech.
Some accidents there are in life that a little folly is necessary to help us out of.
Perfect courage is to do without witnesses what one would be capable of doing with the world looking on.
We have no patience with other people's vanity because it is offensive to our own.
People that are conceited of their own merit take pride in being unfortunate, that themselves and others may think them considerable enough to be the envy and the mark of fortune.
