Sebastien-Roch Nicolas De Chamfort
27 quotations
No law reaches it, but all right-minded people observe it.
Real worth requires no interpreter: its everyday deeds form its emblem.
Man arrives as a novice at each age of his life.
Celebrity is the advantage of being known to people who we don't know, and who don't know us.
Change of fashion is the tax levied by the industry of the poor on the vanity of the rich.
How many fools does it take to make up a public?
There are well-dressed foolish ideas, just as there are will-dressed fools.
Pleasure can be supported by an illusion; but happiness rests upon truth.
A person of intellect without energy added to it, is a failure.
We leave unmolested those who set the fire to the house, and prosecute those who sound the alarm.
The most wasted of all days is that on which one has not laughed.
Some things are easier to legalize than to legitimate.
Whatever evil a man may think of women, there is no woman but thinks more.
Conviction is the conscience of the mind.
Preoccupation with money is the great test of small natures, but only a small test of great ones.
If it were not for the government, we should have nothing to laugh at in France.
All passions exaggerate; and they are passions only because they do exaggerate.
Philosophy, like medicine, has plenty of drugs, few good remedies, and hardly any specific cures.
Pleasure may come from illusion, but happiness can come only of reality.
There are certain times when public opinion is the worst of all opinions.
People are governed with the head; kindness of heart is little use in chess.
Eminence without merit earns deference without esteem.
Secrecy is best taught by starting with ourselves.
Society is divided into two classes, the shearers and the shorn.
Success makes success, like money makes money.