"In the intercourse of life, we please..." - Quote by Francois De La Rochefoucauld
In the intercourse of life, we please more by our faults than by our good qualities.
More by Francois De La Rochefoucauld
“Jealousy is in some measure just and reasonable, since it merely aims at keeping something that belongs to us or we think belongsto us, whereas envy is a frenzy that cannot bear anything that belongs to others.”
“We often select envenomed praise which, by a reaction upon those we praise, shows faults we could not have shown by other means.”
“We are more interested in making others believe we are happy than in trying to be happy ourselves.”
More on Human Nature
“Men hate the individual whom they call avaricious only because there is nothing to be gained by him.”
“You do not know the unfathomable cowardice of humanity...servile in the face of force, pitiless in the face of weakness, implacable before blunders, indulgent before crimes...and patient to the point of martyrdom before all the violences of bold despotism.”
“Man is full of desires: he loves only those who can satisfy them all. "This man is a good mathematician," someone will say. But I have no concern for mathematics; he would take me for a proposition. "That one is a good soldier." He would take me for a besieged town. I need, that is to say, a decent man who can accommodate himself to all my desires in a general sort of way.”
More on Social Interaction
“She is probably by this time as tired of me, as I am of her; but as she is too Polite and I am too civil to say so, our letters are still as frequent and affectionate as ever, and our Attachment as firm and sincere as when it first commenced.”
“Well, Ben Rogers, if I was as ignorant as you I wouldn't let on.”
“Praise is flattery, artful, hidden, delicate, which gratifies differently him who praises and him who is praised. The one takes it as the reward of merit, the other bestows it to show his impartiality and knowledge.”