"As favor and riches forsake a man, we discover in him the foolishness they concealed, and which no one perceived before."

Bruyere, Jean De La on Difficulties
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"You may drive a dog off the King's armchair, and it will climb into the preacher's pulpit; he views the world unmoved, unembarrassed, unabashed."

Bruyere, Jean De La on Dogs
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"From time to time there appear on the face of the earth men of rare and consummate excellence, who dazzle us by their virtue, and whose outstanding qualities shed a stupendous light. Like those extraordinary stars of whose origins we are ignorant, and of whose fate, once they have vanished, we know even less, such men have neither forebears nor descendants: they are the whole of their race."

Bruyere, Jean De La on Excellence
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"There is not in the world so toilsome a trade as the pursuit of fame; life concludes before you have so much as sketched your work."

Bruyere, Jean De La on Fame
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"Two persons cannot long be friends if they cannot forgive each other's little failings."

Bruyere, Jean De La on Friends and Friendship
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"Generosity lies less in giving much than in giving at the right moment."

Bruyere, Jean De La on Generosity
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"There are only two ways of getting on in the world: by one's own industry, or by the stupidity of others."

Bruyere, Jean De La on Getting Ahead
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"That man is good who does good to others; if he suffers on account of the good he does, he is very good; if he suffers at the hands of those to whom he has done good, then his goodness is so great that it could be enhanced only by greater sufferings; and if he should die at their hands, his virtue can go no further: it is heroic, it is perfect."

Bruyere, Jean De La on Altruism
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"The slave has but one master, the ambitious man has as many as there are persons whose aid may contribute to the advancement of his fortunes."

Bruyere, Jean De La on Ambition
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"False greatness is unsociable and remote: conscious of its own frailty, it hides, or at least averts its face, and reveals itself only enough to create an illusion and not be recognized as the meanness that it really is. True greatness is free, kind, familiar and popular; it lets itself be touched and handled, it loses nothing by being seen at close quarters; the better one knows it, the more one admires it."

Bruyere, Jean De La on Greatness
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"Grief at the absence of a loved one is happiness compared to life with a person one hates."

Bruyere, Jean De La on Grief
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"Jesting is often only indigence of intellect."

Bruyere, Jean De La on Jest
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"We must laugh before we are happy, for fear we die before we laugh at all."

Bruyere, Jean De La on Laughter
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"All men's misfortunes spring from their hatred of being alone."

Bruyere, Jean De La on Loneliness
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"We can recognize the dawn and the decline of love by the uneasiness we feel when alone together."

Bruyere, Jean De La on Love
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"To be among people one loves, that's sufficient; to dream, to speak to them, to be silent among them, to think of indifferent things; but among them, everything is equal."

Bruyere, Jean De La on Love
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"One seeks to make the loved one entirely happy, or, if that cannot be, entirely wretched."

Bruyere, Jean De La on Lovers
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"Marriage, it seems, confines every man to his proper rank."

Bruyere, Jean De La on Marriage
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"There 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!"

Bruyere, Jean De La on Mediocrity
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"A vain man finds it wise to speak good or ill of himself; a modest man does not talk of himself."

Bruyere, Jean De La on Modesty
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"The Opera is obviously the first draft of a fine spectacle; it suggests the idea of one."

Bruyere, Jean De La on Opera
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"Everything has been said, and we have come too late, now that men have been living and thinking for seven thousand years and more."

Bruyere, Jean De La on Originality
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"There is no road too long to the man who advances deliberately and without undue haste; there are no honors too distant to the man who prepares himself for them with patience."

Bruyere, Jean De La on Patience
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"As long as men are liable to die and are desirous to live, a physician will be made fun of, but he will be well paid."

Bruyere, Jean De La on Physicians
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"A bachelor's life is a fine breakfast, a flat lunch, and a miserable dinner."

Bruyere, Jean De La on Bachelor
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"We should keep silent about those in power; to speak well of them almost implies flattery; to speak ill of them while they are alive is dangerous, and when they are dead is cowardly."

Bruyere, Jean De La on Power
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"A heap of epithets is poor praise: the praise lies in the facts, and in the way of telling them."

Bruyere, Jean De La on Praise
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"Children have neither a past nor a future. Thus they enjoy the present -- which seldom happens to us."

Bruyere, Jean De La on Present
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"Lofty posts make great men greater still, and small men much smaller."

Bruyere, Jean De La on Public Office
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"Nothing more clearly shows how little God esteems his gift to men of wealth, money, position and other worldly goods, than the way he distributes these, and the sort of men who are most amply provided with them."

Bruyere, Jean De La on Riches
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"Outward simplicity befits ordinary men, like a garment made to measure for them; but it serves as an adornment to those who have filled their lives with great deeds: they might be compared to some beauty carelessly dressed and thereby all the more attractive."

Bruyere, Jean De La on Simplicity
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"This great misfortune -- to be incapable of solitude."

Bruyere, Jean De La on Solitude
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"One mark of a second-rate mind is to be always telling stories."

Bruyere, Jean De La on Story and Story-Telling
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"It's motive alone which gives character to the actions of men."

Bruyere, Jean De La on Action
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"Grief that is dazed and speechless is out of fashion: the modern woman mourns her husband loudly and tells you the whole story of his death, which distresses her so much that she forgets not the slightest detail about it."

Bruyere, Jean De La on Bereavement
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"When a book raises your spirit, and inspires you with noble and manly thoughts, seek for no other test of its excellence. It is good, and made by a good workman."

Bruyere, Jean De La on Books - Reading
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"It is fortunate to be of high birth, but it is no less so to be of such character that people do not care to know whether you are or are not."

Bruyere, Jean De La on Character
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"The giving is the hardest part; what does it cost to add a smile?"

Bruyere, Jean De La on Charity
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"Between good sense and good taste there lies the difference between a cause and its effect."

Bruyere, Jean De La on Taste
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"The sweetest of all sounds is that of the voice of the woman we love."

Bruyere, Jean De La on Voice
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