Maxims Flashcards
Suspect your passions
When they want to appear logical. They are government by self-interest and are dangerous guides.
People hate those to whom
They are under obligation. (Question this)
A man condemned to die
Often affects a firmness and a scorn of death which are at bottom, his fear of facing it. This stoicism is to his eyes what the bandage is to his eyes.
Our good qualities draw
Harsher criticisms than our bad
Had we no faults,
We should not take so much pleasure in discovering them in others
Jealousy thrives on…while…
Doubt. Certainty goads it to fury, or ends it.
Pride spares
Us the painful awareness of our shortcomings
We criticize faults less to
Correct them, than to prove that we do not possess them.
Egotism plays many parts, even that
Of altruism
Performances are measured by
Fear (or lack of it)
Most men are too weak
To follow their best judgement
Man thinks he leads…when his head…
Even when he is being led. When his head seeks one goal, his heart imperceptibly draws him to another.
True happiness lies in that which
Pleases ourselves, not others
Self-satisfied men pride themselves on their misfortunes
So they can persuade themselves, and others, that they are worthy to be the butts of fate.
To gain a position in the world
We go to any lengths to convince people we have one
However much credit men take for their achievements,
Chance is more often responsible than wisdom
A clever man…while a fool..
A clever man can benefit from catastrophe, while a fool can turn good luck to his disadvantage
Sincerity is…but…
Open-heartedness, but in most, what looks like sincerity is dissimulation practiced to gain the confidence of others
Grace is to the body
What reason is to the mind
Judged by its consequences, Love is
More akin to hate than to affection
It’s not as hard to find a woman who has never committed an indiscretion
As it is to find a woman who has committed only one (it opens the floodgates)
In most men, love of justice
Is but a fear of suffering injustice
What we call friendship
Is a scheme for the mutual exchange of advantages and favors that improves our self-esteem;
A waning love-affair
Welcomes an infidelity as a release (from constancy)
People sacrifice themselves to friends in high places
Out of interested motives, and so they may profit
Distrust justifies
Its deceptions
Why expect others to guard our secrets
If we cannot keep them ourselves (in the first place).
We judge other’s merits
Based on how they treat us (and/or how well we like them).
Lazy men are..they seek to..
The hardest taskmasters. They seek to appear diligent when they have satisfied their own sloth.
Old people like to give good advice
Because they can no longer set bad examples
Grudging praise by the envious
Is proof of exceptional merit
Judgement is
The light of the mind, goes to the root of things, perceives what should be noted
No ones hesitates to praise his own heart
But one must dare to praise his mind
Intellectual politeness
Reveals delicacy and purity of thought
Intellectual gallantry is the art of saying
Flattering things in an agreeable way
A spontaneous expression
Is often more accurate than the most studied effort
Those who know their minds best
Know their hearts least (thinkers)
Stumbling on wisdom makes
No man wise.
One type of flirting
Is calling attention to our sincerity (“no, I’m serious!”)
The mind cannot pretend
To be the heart for long
We are never as liberal as with
Advice
We never forget or forgive a friend or foe who betrayed us, yet
We never resent it when we betray ourselves
A man is never less sincere than when
He asks for or gives advice; in asking for counsel, he seeks for his friend to commend his actions; in giving advice, you repay the confidence of others while furthering your own ends through your counsel (in many men)
No deception is keener than
Feigning cleverly to fall into a trap that was laid for you. People are most often deceived when they seek to deceive others (and the intended deceived becomes the deceiver)
A desire not to deceive others
Constantly lays us open to deception
Deception is often the fruit
Of weakness, (or inability to handle or admit the truth), than the intent to deceive
((Sometimes people lie to you
Because they can’t handle their own truth, or prefer the lie to the truth, because they don’t lie who they are and would spare you that))
Often we do right that
Later we may do wrong with impunity
When we resist temptation it is
Often because the temptation is weak (or we are temporarily immunized to it), not because we are strong
The cleverest men go through life
Decrying trickery, either to be in a position to deceive others in a crisis, or to achieve a great ambition
Habitual trickery
Is a sign of small intellect
Super cleverness is…true…
Is indelicate; true delicacy rests on true cleverness
The surest way to be deceived
Is to think yourself clever than your neighbor or friends or enemy
It is easier to preach
Virtue than to practice it
Our true qualities never make us as
Ridiculous as those we affect
We prefer to malign
Ourselves than to not talk about ourselves at all
Even the most charming and clever do little more than appear attentive
While in their eyes flash a look of bewilderment when the other talks, so anxious to return to their own ideas. (Listen well: To be bent on pleasing yourself is a poor way of pleasing or convincing others).
We boast that we are never lonely only
Because we are too vain to admit we find ourselves poor company
Powerful intellects say much in few words, while
Small minds talk much and say little
We emphasize the good qualities of others
More because we esteem our own virtues, inviting praise by appearing to praise others
