Ninon de L'Enclos

The passions do not die out; they burn out.

— Ninon de L'Enclos

The loss of friends is a tax on age!

— Ninon de L'Enclos

The less heart, the more comfort.

— Ninon de L'Enclos

Novelty is the storehouse of pleasure.

— Ninon de L'Enclos

The secret known to two is no longer a secret.

— Ninon de L'Enclos

Firmness is great; persistency is greater.

— Ninon de L'Enclos

Old age is women's hell.

— Ninon de L'Enclos

Gentleness! more powerful than Hercules.

— Ninon de L'Enclos

Memory is ever active, ever true. Alas, if it were only as easy to forget!

— Ninon de L'Enclos

It is strange that modesty is the rule for women when what they most value in men is boldness.

— Ninon de L'Enclos

The joy of the mind is the measure of its strength.

— Ninon de L'Enclos

Hatred is nearly always honest--rarely, if ever, assumed. So much cannot be said for love.

— Ninon de L'Enclos

Oaths are the counterfeit money with which we pay the sacrifice of love.

— Ninon de L'Enclos

If God had to give a woman wrinkles, He might at least have put them on the soles of her feet.

— Ninon de L'Enclos

Indiscretion and wickedness, be it known, are first cousins.

— Ninon de L'Enclos

It requires infinitely a greater genius to make love, than to make war.

— Ninon de L'Enclos

The mind has great advantages over the body; however the body often furnishes little treats ... which offer the mind relief from…

— Ninon de L'Enclos

If a man needs a religion to conduct himself properly in this world, it is a sign that he has either a…

— Ninon de L'Enclos

Who has not raised a tombstone, here and there, over buried hopes and dead joys, on the road of life? Like the…

— Ninon de L'Enclos

Never tell a loved one of an infidelity: you would be badly rewarded for your troubles. Although one dislikes being deceived, one…

— Ninon de L'Enclos

That which is striking and beautiful is not always good, but that which is good is always beautiful.

— Ninon de L'Enclos

A cunning woman is her own mistress because she confides in no one. She who deceives others anticipates deceit, and guards herself.

— Ninon de L'Enclos

There are other things besides beauty with which to captivate the hearts of men. The Italians have a saying: "Fair is not…

— Ninon de L'Enclos

Today a new sun rises for me; everything lives, everything is animated, everything seems to speak to me of my passion, everything…

— Ninon de L'Enclos

I hold those wise who know how to be happy.

— Ninon de L'Enclos

Glances are the first billets-doux of love.

— Ninon de L'Enclos

Old age is a woman's hell.

— Ninon de L'Enclos

Gossip, like ennui, is born of idleness.

— Ninon de L'Enclos

Fair is not fair, but that which pleaseth.

— Ninon de L'Enclos

Inconstancy is the child of satiety.

— Ninon de L'Enclos

Wit is a dangerous talent in friendship.

— Ninon de L'Enclos

Love without desire is a delusion: it does not exist in nature.

— Ninon de L'Enclos

Soft moonlight and tender love harmonize together wonderfully.

— Ninon de L'Enclos

After the age of eighty, all contemporaries are friends.

— Ninon de L'Enclos

It takes a hundred times more skill to make love than to command an army.

— Ninon de L'Enclos

There is always a moment in the pyramid of our lives when the apex is reached.

— Ninon de L'Enclos

Feminine virtue is nothing but a convenient masculine invention.

— Ninon de L'Enclos

Ennui, the parent of expensive and ruinous vices.

— Ninon de L'Enclos

Men lose more conquests by their own awkwardness than by any virtue in the woman.

— Ninon de L'Enclos

Friendship should be in the singular; it can be no more plural than love.

— Ninon de L'Enclos