Duc de La Rochefoucauld

It is never so difficult to speak as when we are ashamed of our silence.

We come fresh to the different stages of life, and in each of them we are quite inexperienced, no matter how old we are.

To safeguard one's health at the cost of too strict a diet is a tiresome illness indeed.

As it is the characteristic of great wits to convey a great deal in a few words, so, on the contrary, small wits have the gift of speaking much and saying nothing.

Were we to take as much pains to be what we ought, as we do to disguise what we are, we might appear like ourselves without being at the trouble of any disguise at all.

To establish oneself in the world, one does all one can to seem established there already.

When we are unable to find tranquillity within ourselves, it is useless to seek it elsewhere.

Tricks and treachery are merely proofs of lack of skill.

He who thinks he can find in himself the means of doing without others is much mistaken; but he who thinks that others cannot do without him is still more mistaken.

It is easier to deceive yourself, and to do so unperceived, than to deceive another.