The great always sell their society to the vanity of the little.
Vain is equivalent to empty; thus vanity is so miserable a thing, that one cannot give it a worse name than its own. It proclaims itself for what it is.
In the fine arts, as in many other things, we know well only what we have not learned.
In great matters, men behave as they are expected to; in little ones, as they would naturally
It is commonly supposed that the art of pleasing is a wonderful aid in the pursuit of fortune; but the art of being bored is infinitely more successful.
Hope is but a charlatan that ceases not to deceive us. For myself happiness only began when I had lost it.
Real worth requires no interpreter: its everyday deeds form its emblem.
Celebrity is the advantage of being known to people who we don't know, and who don't know us.
How many fools does it take to make up a public?
Slander is the balm of malignity.
Most anthologists of poetry or quotations are like those who eat cherries or oysters, first picking the best and ending by eating everything.
All passions are exaggerated, otherwise they would not be passions.
People are governed by the head; a kind heart is of little value in chess.
It's a question of prudence. Nobody has a high opinion of fishwives but who would dare offend them while walking through the fish market.
If a woman were about to proceed to her execution, she would demand a little time to perfect her toilet.
Someone described Providence as the baptismal name of chance; no doubt some pious person will retort that chance is the nickname of Providence.
An economist is a surgeon with an excellent scalpel and a rough-edged lancet, who operates beautifully on the dead and tortures the living.
We must start human society from scratch; as Francis Bacon said, we must recreate human understanding.
Men whose only concern is other people's opinion of them are like actors who put on a poor performance to win the applause of people of poor taste; some of them would be capable of good acting in front of a good audience. A decent man plays his part to the best of his ability, regardless of the taste of the gallery.
The success of many books is due to the affinity between the mediocrity of the author's ideas and those of the public.
It is with happiness as with watches: the less complicated, the less easily deranged.
Scandal is an importunate wasp, against which we must make no movement unless we are quite sure that we can kill it; otherwise it will return to the attack more furious than ever.
In order to forgive reason for the evil it has wrought on the majority of men, we must imagine for ourselves what man would be without his reason. 'Tis a necessary evil.
At the sight of what goes on in the world, the most misanthropic of men must end by being amused, and Heraclitus must die laughing.
Satire is the disease of art.
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