My notes from La Rochefoucauld: Collected Maxims

[cypres]

29. Our evil deeds do not bring on us as much persecution and hatred as our good qualities.

34. If we had no pride, we would not complain of it in other people.

117. The most refined form of cunning is the art of pretending to fall into the traps that have been set before us; and we never are si easily deceived as when we are intent on deceiving other people.

124. The cleverest people spend their whole lives pretending to deplore cunning, so that they can make use of it for som great matter of interest to them, when some great circumstance arise.

125. Habitual use of cunning is the sign of a small mind; and it nearly always happen that the person who uses it to protect himself at one point, exposes himself at another.

126. Betrayals and acts of cunning arise only from a lack of cleverness.

127. The sure way to be deceived is to think yourself more astute than other people.

128. Too much refinement is a false subtlety; and true subtlety is a well-founded refinement.

129. Uncouthness is sometimes enough to save you from being deceived by a clever man.

132. It is easier to be wise for other people than for yourself.

134. The qualities we have never make us as absurd as those who we pretend to have.

136. There are people who would never have been in love if they had never heard love mentioned.

137. We have little to say when vanity is not making us speak.

138. We would rather speal ill of ourselves than say nothing about ourselves at all.

144. Praise gratifies the giver by drawing attention to his fair-mindedness and perceptiveness.

145. Some use praise to reveal faults.

149. A refusal of praise is a desire to be praised twice over.

158. Flattery is a false coin given currency only by our vanity.

178. What makes us like new acquaintances is not so much our weariness of the old ones, or the pleasure of changing, as frustration that we are not admired enough by those who know us too well, and the hope of being admired more by those who are less well acquainted with us.

246. What seems to be generosity is often merely a disguised form of ambition, which disdains small interests in order to pursue great ones.

327. We confess small faults only to convince people that we have no greater ones.

366. However we may mistrust the sincerity of those who talk to us, we thinkk they are more truthful with us than others.

383. The wish to talk about ourselves, and to show our faults from the angles that we ourselves would choose, makes up a large part of our sincerity.

450. What we take away from our other faults is often added to our pride.

 

[Ibn Sina]

Thanx