If a handsome woman allows that another woman is beautiful, we may safely conclude she excels her.
Jean de la BruyereWhen we are dead we are praised by those who survive us, though we frequently have no other merit than that of being no longer alive.
Jean de la BruyereA mediocre mind thinks it writes divinely; a good mind thinks it writes reasonably.
Jean de la BruyereYoung people are dazzled by the brilliancy of antithesis, and employ it. Matter-of-fact men, and those who like precision, naturally fall into comparisons and metaphor. Sprightly natures, full of fire, and whom a boundless imagination carries beyond all rules, and even what is reasonable, cannot rest satisfied even with hyperbole. As for the sublime, it is only great geniuses and those of the very highest order that are able to rise to its height.
Jean de la BruyereI am told so many ill things of a man, and I see so few in him, that I begin to suspect he has a real but troublesome merit, as being likely to eclipse that of others.
Jean de la BruyereThe best thing next to wit is a consciousness that it is not in us; without wit, a man might then know how to behave himself, so as not to appear to be a fool or a coxcomb.
Jean de la BruyereWe seek our happiness outside ourselves, and in the opinion of men we know to be flatterers, insincere, unjust, full of envy, caprice and prejudice.
Jean de la BruyereTwo persons cannot long be friends if they cannot forgive each other's little failings.
Jean de la BruyereA man can keep another's secret better than his own. A woman her own better than others.
Jean de la BruyereIt is a sad thing when men have neither enough intelligence to speak well nor enough sense to hold their tongues; this is the root of all impertinence.
Jean de la BruyereIf some persons died, and others did not die, death would be a terrible affliction.
Jean de la BruyereThere is a false modesty, which is vanity; a false glory, which is levity; a false grandeur, which is meanness; a false virtue, which is hypocrisy, and a false wisdom, which is prudery.
Jean de la BruyereHigh birth is a gift of fortune which should never challenge esteem towards those who receive it, since it costs them neither study nor labor.
Jean de la BruyereThe regeneration of society is the regeneration of society by individual education.
Jean de la BruyereAmongst such as out of cunning hear all and talk little, be sure to talk less; or if you must talk, say little.
Jean de la BruyereIt would be a kind of ferocity to reject indifferently all sorts of praise. One should be glad to have that which comes from good men who praise in sincerity things that are really praiseworthy.
Jean de la BruyereThe nearer we come to great men the more clearly we see that they are only men. They rarely seem great to their valets.
Jean de la BruyereThe pleasure we feel in criticizing robs us from being moved by very beautiful things.
Jean de la BruyereWe hope to grow old and we dread old age; that is to say, we love life and we flee from death.
Jean de la BruyereThe 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 BruyereThe State not seldom tolerates a comparatively great evil to keep out millions of lesser ills and inconveniences which otherwise would be inevitable and without remedy.
Jean de la BruyereThere is nothing which continues longer than a moderate fortune; nothing of which one sees sooner the end than a large fortune.
Jean de la BruyereThere are certain things in which mediocrity is intolerable: poetry, music, painting, public eloquence. What torture it is to hear a frigid speech being pompously declaimed, or second-rate verse spoken with all a bad poet's bombast!
Jean de la Bruyere