Men despise great projects when they do not feel themselves capable of great successes. — Luc de Clapiers Copy Share Image
No one is more liable to make mistakes than he who acts only on reflexion. — Luc de Clapiers Copy Share Image
Men crowd into honorable careers without other vocation than their vanity, or at best their love of fame. — Luc de Clapiers Copy Share Image
Great men undertake great things because they are great; fools, because they think them easy. — Luc de Clapiers Copy Share Image
The mind of man is more intuitive than logical, and comprehends more than it can coordinate. — Luc de Clapiers Copy Share Image
Great men in teaching weak men to reflect have set them on the road to error. — Luc de Clapiers Copy Share Image
A man who love only himself and his pleasures is vain, presumptuous, and wicked even from principle. — Luc de Clapiers Copy Share Image
The maxim that men are not to be praised before their death was invented by envy and too lightly adopted by philosophers. — Luc de Clapiers Copy Share Image
Men dissimulate their dearest, most constant, and most virtuous inclination from weakness and a fear of being condemned. — Luc de Clapiers Copy Share Image
The falsest of all philosophies is that which, under the pretext of delivering men from the embarrassment of their passions, counsels idleness… — Luc de Clapiers Copy Share Image
The greatest evil that fortune can bring to men is to endow them with feeble resources and yet to make them ambitious. — Luc de Clapiers Copy Share Image
Learn to overrule minor interest in favor of great ones, and generously to do all the good the heart prompts; a man… — Luc de Clapiers Copy Share Image
In order to protect himself from force, man was obliged to submit to justice. Justice or force: he was compelled to choose… — Luc de Clapiers Copy Share Image
I do not approve the maxim which desires a man to know a little of everything. Superficial knowledge, knowledge without principles, is… — Luc de Clapiers Copy Share Image
Persevere in the fight, struggle on, do not let go, think magnanimously of man and life, for man is good and life… — Luc de Clapiers Copy Share Image
You can purchase the mind of Pascal for a crown. Pleasures even cheaper are sold to those who give themselves up to… — Luc de Clapiers Copy Share Image
If a man is endowed with a noble and courageous soul, if he is painstaking, proud, ambitious, without meanness, of a profound… — Luc de Clapiers Copy Share Image
The generality of men are so bound within the sphere of their circumstances that they have not even the courage to get… — Luc de Clapiers Copy Share Image
All that causes one man to differ from another is a very slight thing. What is it that is the origin of… — Luc de Clapiers Copy Share Image
The maxim that men are not to be praised before their death was invented by envy and too lightly adopted by philosophers.… — Luc de Clapiers Copy Share Image
Newton, Pascal, Bossuet, Racine, F?nelon -- that is to say, some of the most enlightened men on earth, in the most philosophical… — Luc de Clapiers Copy Share Image
As soon as an opinion becomes common it is sufficient reason for men to abandon it and to uphold the opposite opinion… — Luc de Clapiers Copy Share Image
Superficial knowledge ... is hurtful to those who possess true genius; for it necessarily draws them away from their main object, wastes… — Luc de Clapiers Copy Share Image
We are less hurt by the contempt of fools than by the lukewarm approval of men of intelligence. — Luc de Clapiers Copy Share Image
We must expect everything and fear everything from time and from men. — Luc de Clapiers Copy Share Image
There does not exist a man sufficiently intelligent never to be tiresome. — Luc de Clapiers Copy Share Image
Great men undertake great things because they are great; fools, because they think them easy. — Luc de Clapiers Copy Share
You must rouse into people's consciousness their own prudence and strength, if you want to raise their character. — Luc de Clapiers Copy Share
To achieve great things we must live as though we were never going to die. — Luc de Clapiers Copy Share
Excessive distrust is not less hurtfJul than its opposite. Most men become useless to him who is unwilling to risk being deceived. — Luc de Clapiers Copy Share
There are those who are so scrupulously afraid of doing wrong that they seldom venture to do anything. — Luc de Clapiers Copy Share
The most absurd and reckless aspirations have sometimes led to extraordinary success. — Luc de Clapiers Copy Share
We are very wrong to think that some fault or other can exclude virtue, or to consider the alliance of good and evil as… — Luc de Clapiers Copy Share
Men are not to be judged by what they do not know, but by what they know, and by the manner in which they… — Luc de Clapiers Copy Share
Men dissimulate their dearest, most constant, and most virtuous inclination from weakness and a fear of being condemned. — Luc de Clapiers Copy Share
To withdraw ourselves from the law of the strong, we have found ourselves obliged to submit to justice. Justice or might, we must choose… — Luc de Clapiers Copy Share
None are more liable to mistakes than those who act only on second thoughts. — Luc de Clapiers Copy Share
The mind is the soul's eye, not its source of power. That lies in the heart, in other words, in the passions. — Luc de Clapiers Copy Share
It is easier to say new things than to reconcile those which have already been said. — Luc de Clapiers Copy Share
It is of no use to possess a lively wit if it is not of the right proportion: the perfection of a clock is… — Luc de Clapiers Copy Share
