Nicolas Chamfort

Slander is the balm of malignity.

— Nicolas Chamfort

We take our colors, chameleon-like, from each other.

— Nicolas Chamfort

Some things are easier to legalize than to legitimate.

— Nicolas Chamfort

Knowledge is boundless,--human capacity, limited.

— Nicolas Chamfort

Marriage follows on love as smoke on flame.

— Nicolas Chamfort

Chance is a nickname for Providence.

— Nicolas Chamfort

One must not hope to be more than one can be.

— Nicolas Chamfort

He who leaves the game wins it.

— Nicolas Chamfort

To possess a good cognomen is a long way on the road of success in life.

— Nicolas Chamfort

The great always sell their society to the vanity of the little.

— Nicolas Chamfort

We gild our medicines with sweets; why not clothe truth and morals in peasant garments as well?

— Nicolas Chamfort

Swallow a toad in the morning and you will encounter nothing more disgusting the rest of the day.

— Nicolas Chamfort

We need to be just before we are generous, as we need shirts before ruffles.

— Nicolas Chamfort

“Paris, a city of gaieties and pleasures, where four-fifths of the inhabitants die of grief.”

— Nicolas Chamfort

The art of the parenthesis is one of the greatest secrets of eloquence in Society

— Nicolas Chamfort

Woman's weakness, not man's merit, oftenest gains the suitor's victory.

— Nicolas Chamfort

There is no history worthy attention save that of free nations; the history of nations under the sway of despotism is no…

— Nicolas Chamfort

It is among uneducated women that we may look for the most confirmed gossips. Goethe tells us there is nothing more frightful…

— Nicolas Chamfort

If taking vitamins doesn't keep you healthy enough, try more laughter: The most wasted of all days is that on which one…

— Nicolas Chamfort

[Prudence] replaces [strength] by saving the man who has the misfortune of not possessing it from most occasions when it's needed.

— Nicolas Chamfort

It is children only who enjoy the present; their elders either live on the memory of the past or the hope of…

— Nicolas Chamfort

It's a question of prudence. Nobody has a high opinion of fishwives but who would dare offend them while walking through the…

— Nicolas Chamfort

Scandal is an importunate wasp, against which we must make no movement unless we are quite sure that we can kill it;…

— Nicolas Chamfort

Too elevated qualities often unfit a man for society. We do not go to market with ingots, but with silver and small…

— Nicolas Chamfort

She commands who is blest with indifference.

— Nicolas Chamfort

Conviction is the conscience of intellect.

— Nicolas Chamfort

Eminence without merit earns deference without esteem.

— Nicolas Chamfort

Do not suppose opportunity will knock twice at your door.

— Nicolas Chamfort

Women of the world crave excitement.

— Nicolas Chamfort

Man reaches each stage of his life as a novice.

— Nicolas Chamfort

Do you think that revolutions are made with rose water?

— Nicolas Chamfort

Almost the whole of history is but a sequence of horrors.

— Nicolas Chamfort

A modicum of discord is the very spice of courtship.

— Nicolas Chamfort

The poor are the blacks of Europe.

— Nicolas Chamfort

Remorse turns us against ourselves.

— Nicolas Chamfort

Contemptuous people are sure to be contemptible.

— Nicolas Chamfort

Where violence reigns, reason is weak.

— Nicolas Chamfort

Be my brother or I will kill you.

— Nicolas Chamfort

Narrow waists and narrow minds go together.

— Nicolas Chamfort

Bachelors' wives and old maids' children are always perfect.

— Nicolas Chamfort