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| A pedant holds more to instruct us with what he knows, than of what we are ignorant. | 1 |
| Adversity, which makes us indulgent to others, renders them severe towards us. | 2 |
| Age whitens hairs, but not sin. | 3 |
| An angry woman is vindictive beyond measure, and hesitates at nothing in her bitterness. | 4 |
| Another life, if it were not better than this, would be less a promise than a threat. | 5 |
| Beauty and ugliness disappear equally under the wrinkles of age; one is lost in them; the other hidden. | 6 |
| Conscience serves us especially to judge of the actions of others. | 7 |
| Do not crowd the understanding; it can comprehend so much and no more. A pint pot will not contain the measure of a quart. | 8 |
| Do you know a young and beautiful woman who is not ready to flirt—just a little? | 9 |
| Doubt springs from the mind; faith is the daughter of the soul. | 10 |
| Envy, like flame, blackens that which is above it, and which it cannot reach. | 11 |
| Every generous illusion of youth leaves a wrinkle as it departs. Experience is the successive disenchanting of the things of life; it is reason enriched with the heart’s spoils. | 12 |
| Experience unveils too late the snares laid for youth; it is the white frost which discovers the spider’s web when the flies are no longer there to be caught. | 13 |
| Genius, like a torch, shines less in the broad daylight of the present than in the night of the past. | 14 |
| Happiness is where we find it, but very rarely where we seek it. | 15 |
| How many wells of science there are in whose depths there is nothing but clear water! | 16 |
| In a better world we will find our young years and our old friends. | 17 |
| In giving alms, let us rather look at the needs of the poor than his claim to your charity. | 18 |
| In love we are not only liable to betray ourselves, but also the secrets of others. | 19 |
| It is easy to be virtuous in prospective. | 20 |
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| It is more pitiable once to have been rich than not to be rich now. | 21 |
| It is only before those who are glad to hear it, and anxious to spread it, that we find it easy to speak ill of others. | 22 |
| It requires less character to discover the faults of others than to tolerate them. | 23 |
| Let us believe neither half of the good people tell us of ourselves, nor half the evil they say of others. | 24 |
| Let us respect gray hairs, but, above all, our own. | 25 |
| Loud indignation against vice often stands for virtue with bigots. | 26 |
| Many fortunes, like rivers, have a pure source, but grow muddy as they grow large. | 27 |
| Money dishonestly acquired is never worth its cost, while a good conscience never costs as much as it is worth. | 28 |
| No woman dares express all she thinks. | 29 |
| None despise fame more heartily than those who have no possible claim to it. | 30 |
| Not what we have, but what we enjoy, constitutes our abundance. | 31 |
| Of all trifles, titles are the lightest. | 32 |
| Our interests are grains of opium to our consciences, but they only put it to sleep for a terrible awakening. | 33 |
| Our virtues live upon our incomes; our vices consume our capital. | 34 |
| People who declare that they belong to no party certainly do not belong to ours. | 35 |
| Perfect servants would be the worst of all for certain masters, whose happiness consists in finding fault with them. | 36 |
| Pleasure and satiety live next door to each other. | 37 |
| Pleasure limps for him who enjoys it alone. | 38 |
| Promises retain men better than services; for hope is to them a chain, and gratitude a thread. | 39 |
| Public opinion is a courtesan, whom we seek to please without respecting. | 40 |
| Rage is a short-lived fury. | 41 |
| Religion is the hospital of the souls that the world has wounded. | 42 |
| Some delicate matters must be treated like pins, because if they are not seized by the right end, we get pricked. | 43 |
| That experience which does not make us better makes us worse. | 44 |
| That prudery which survives youth and beauty resembles a scarecrow left in the fields after harvest. | 45 |
| The grave is a crucible where memory is purified; we only remember a dead friend by those qualities which make him regretted. | 46 |
| The great chastisement of a knave is not to be known, but to know himself. | 47 |
| The happiness of the tender heart is increased by what it can take away from the wretchedness of others. | 48 |
| The hatred we bear our enemies injures their happiness less than our own. | 49 |
| The less power a man has, the more he likes to use it. | 50 |
| The most exacting jailer is our own conscience. | 51 |
| The politics of courtiers resemble their shadows; they cringe and turn with the sun of the day. | 52 |
| The true worth of a soul is revealed as much by the motive it attributes to the actions of others as by its own deeds. | 53 |
| The virtuous woman flees from danger; she trusts more to her prudence in shunning it than in her strength to overcome it. | 54 |
| The weak-minded man is the slave of his vices and the dupe of his virtues. | 55 |
| The wisest man may always learn something from the humblest peasant. | 56 |
| The wonderful fortune of some writers deludes and leads to misery a great number of young people. It cannot be too often repeated that it is dangerous to enter upon a career of letters without some other means of living. An illustrious author has said in these times, “Literature must not be leant on as upon a crutch; it is little more than a stick.” | 57 |
| There are philanthropists who, incapable of managing their own little affairs, take upon themselves those of the whole world; but as their creditors always outnumber their disciples, they owe humanity more than she will ever owe them. | 58 |
| There are some errors so sweet that we repent them only to bring them to memory. | 59 |
| There are wounds of self-love which one does not confess to one’s dearest friends. | 60 |
| There is a proverb in the South that a woman laughs when she can, and weeps when she pleases. | 61 |
| There is certainly no beauty on earth which exceeds the natural loveliness of woman. | 62 |
| There is no beauty on earth which exceeds the natural loveliness of woman. | 63 |
| Those virtues which cost us dear prove that we love God; those which are easy to us prove that He loves us. | 64 |
| To endeavor to move by the same discourse hearers who differ in age, sex, position and education, is to attempt to open all locks with the same key. | 65 |
| To protect ourselves against the storms of passion, marriage with a good woman is a harbor in the tempest; but with a bad woman it is a tempest in the harbor. | 66 |
| True courage is like a kite: a contrary wind raises it higher. | 67 |
| We are told to walk noiselessly through the world, that we may waken neither hatred nor envy; but, alas! What can we do when they never sleep! | 68 |
| We find ourselves less witty in remembering what we have said than in dreaming of what we would have said. | 69 |
| We forget the origin of a parvenu if he remembers it; we remember it if he forgets it. | 70 |
| We tire of those pleasures we take, but never of those we give. | 71 |
| What we gain by experience is not worth that we lose in illusion. | 72 |
| Without big words, how could many people say small things? | 73 |
| Women always find their bitterest foes among their own sex. | 74 |
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