French philosopher and moralist (1645-1696)
The same common-sense which makes an author write good things, makes him dread they are not good enough to deserve reading.
JEAN DE LA BRUYÈRE
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"Of Works of the Mind", Les Caractères
The finest and most beautiful ideas on morals and manners have been swept away before our times, and nothing is left for us but to glean after the ancients and the ablest amongst the moderns.
JEAN DE LA BRUYÈRE
"Of Works of the Mind", Les Caractères
Sudden love takes the longest time to be cured.
JEAN DE LA BRUYÈRE
"Of the Affections", Les Caractères
Marriage, it seems, confines every man to his proper rank.
JEAN DE LA BRUYÈRE
"Of Personal Merit", Les Caractères
It is weakness which makes us hate an enemy and seek revenge, and it is idleness that pacifies us and causes us to neglect it.
JEAN DE LA BRUYÈRE
"Of the Affections", Les Caractères
It is a fool's privilege to laugh at an intelligent man.
JEAN DE LA BRUYÈRE
"Of Society and of Conversation", Les Caractères
He who knows how to wait for what he desires does not feel very desperate if he fails in obtaining it; and he, on the contrary, who is very impatient in procuring a certain thing, takes so much pains about it, that, even when he is successful, he does not think himself sufficiently rewarded.
JEAN DE LA BRUYÈRE
"Of the Affections", Les Caractères
False modesty is the last refinement of vanity.
JEAN DE LA BRUYÈRE
attributed, Day's Collacon
A preacher must have some intelligence to charm the people by his florid style, by his exhilarating system of morality, by the repetition of his figures of speech, his brilliant remarks and vivid descriptions ; but, after all, he has not too much of it, for if he possessed some of the right quality he would neglect these extraneous ornaments, unworthy of the Gospel, and preach naturally, forcibly, and like a Christian.
JEAN DE LA BRUYÈRE
"Of the Pulpit", Les Caractères
The true spirit of conversation consists more in bringing out the cleverness of others than in showing a great deal of it yourself.
JEAN DE LA BRUYÈRE
"Of Society and of Conversation", Les Caractères
Some people pretend they never were in love and never wrote poetry; two weaknesses which they dare not own -- one of the heart, the other of the mind.
JEAN DE LA BRUYÈRE
"Of the Affections", Les Caractères
How many men are like trees, already strong and full grown, which are transplanted into some gardens, to the astonishment of those people who behold them in these fine spots, where they never saw them grow, and who neither know their beginning nor their progress!
JEAN DE LA BRUYÈRE
"Of the Gifts of Fortune", Les Caractères
Among some people arrogance supplies the place of grandeur, inhumanity of decision, and roguery of intelligence.
JEAN DE LA BRUYÈRE
"Of Mankind", Les Caractères
We should like those whom we love to receive all their happiness, or, if this were impossible, all their unhappiness from our hands.
JEAN DE LA BRUYÈRE
"Of the Affections", Les Caractères
The pleasure of criticism takes away from us the pleasure of being deeply moved by very fine things.
JEAN DE LA BRUYÈRE
"Of Works of the Mind", Les Caractères
The critics, or those who, thinking themselves so, decide deliberately and decisively about all public representations, group and divide themselves into different parties, each of whom admires a certain poem or a certain music and damns all others, urged on by a wholly different motive than public interest or justice. The ardour with which they defend their prejudices damages the opposite party as well as their own set. These men discourage poets and musicians by a thousand contradictions, and delay the progress of arts and sciences, by depriving them of the advantages to be obtained by that emulation and freedom which many excellent masters, each in their own way and according to their own genius, might display in the execution of some very fine works.
JEAN DE LA BRUYÈRE
"Of Works of the Mind", Les Caractères
Nothing makes us better understand what trifling things Providence thinks He bestows on men in granting them wealth, money, dignities, and other advantages, than the manner in which they are distributed and the kind of men who have the largest share.
JEAN DE LA BRUYÈRE
"Of the Gifts of Fortune", Les Caractères
It is often easier as well as more advantageous to conform ourselves to other men's opinions than to bring them over to ours.
JEAN DE LA BRUYÈRE
"Of Society and of Conversation", Les Caractères
If poverty is the mother of all crimes, lack of intelligence is their father.
JEAN DE LA BRUYÈRE
"Of Mankind", Les Caractères
If life be wretched, it is hard to bear it; if it be happy, it is horrible to lose it ; both come to the same thing.
JEAN DE LA BRUYÈRE
"Of Mankind", Les Caractères