If our life is unhappy it is painful to bear; if it is happy it is horrible to lose, So the one is pretty equal to the other.
Jean de la Bruyere

If poverty is the mother of crime, lack of good sense is the father.
Jean de la Bruyere

If some persons died, and others did not die, death would be a terrible affliction.
Jean de la Bruyere

It is a sad thing when men have neither the wit to speak well nor the judgment to hold their tongues.
Jean de la Bruyere

It is fortunate to be of high birth, but it is no less so to be of such character that people do not care to know whether you are or are not.
Jean de la Bruyere

It's motive alone which gives character to the actions of men.
Jean de la Bruyere

Liberality consists less in giving a great deal than in gifts well-timed.
Jean de la Bruyere

Logic is the technique by which we add conviction to truth.
Jean de la Bruyere

Love and friendship exclude each other.
Jean de la Bruyere

Making a book is a craft, like making a clock; it needs more than native wit to be an author.
Jean de la Bruyere

Man has but three events in his life: to be born, to live, and to die. He is not conscious of his birth, he suffers at his death and he forgets to live.
Jean de la Bruyere

Marriage, it seems, confines every man to his proper rank.
Jean de la Bruyere

Men blush less for their crimes than for their weaknesses and vanity.
Jean de la Bruyere

Next to sound judgment, diamonds and pearls are the rarest things in the world.
Jean de la Bruyere

No man is so perfect, so necessary to his friends, as to give them no cause to miss him less.
Jean de la Bruyere

One mark of a second-rate mind is to be always telling stories.
Jean de la Bruyere

One must laugh before one is happy, or one may die without ever laughing at all.
Jean de la Bruyere

One seeks to make the loved one entirely happy, or, if that cannot be, entirely wretched.
Jean de la Bruyere

Out of difficulties grow miracles.
Jean de la Bruyere

Politeness makes one appear outwardly as they should be within.
Jean de la Bruyere