you; and is(if possible) more desirous to show you your own ignorance than his own learning.

Due attention to the inside of books, and due contempt for the outside, is the proper relation between a man of sense and his books.

Cardinal de Retz observes, very justly, that every numerous assembly is a mob, influenced by their passions, humors, and affections, which nothing but eloquence ever did or ever can engage.

Frivolous curiosity about trifles, and a laborious attention to little objects which neither require nor deserve a moment's thought, lower a man; who from thence is thought (and not unjustly) incapable of greater matters.

Idleness is only the refuge of weak minds, and the holiday of fools.

May you live as long as you are fit to live, but no longer! or may you rather die before you cease to be fit to live!

A joker is near akin to a buffoon
Ablest man will sometimes do weak things
Above trifles, he is never vehement and eager about them
Advise those who do not speak elegantly, not to speak
Always does more than he says
Always some favorite word for the time being
Arrogant pedant
Ascribing the greatest actions to the most trifling causes
Assign the deepest motives for the most trifling actions
Attend to the objects of your expenses, but not to the sums
Attention to the inside of books
Awkward address, ungraceful attitudes and actions
Being in the power of every man to hurt him
Can hardly be said to see what they see
Cardinal Mazarin
Cardinal Richelieu
Complaisance due to the custom of the place
Conjectures supply the defect of unattainable knowledge
Connive at knaves, and tolerate fools
Deep learning is generally tainted with pedantry
Deepest learning, without good-breeding, is unwelcome
Desirous of pleasing
Dictate to them while you seem to be directed by them
Dissimulation is only to hide our own cards
Do not become a virtuoso of small wares
Does not give it you, but he inflicts it upon you
Endeavors to please and oblige our fellow-creatures
Every man pretends to common sense
Every numerous assembly is a mob
Eyes and the ears are the only roads to the heart
Few dare dissent from an established opinion
Few things which people in general know less, than how to love
Flattering people behind their backs
Fools never perceive where they are ill-timed
Friendship upon very slight acquaintance
Frivolous curiosity about trifles
Frivolous, idle people, whose time hangs upon their own hands
Gain the heart, or you gain nothing
General conclusions from certain particular principles
Good manners
Haste and hurry are very different things
Herd of mankind can hardly be said to think
Human nature is always the same
Hurt those they love by a mistaken indulgence
Idleness is only the refuge of weak minds
If I don't mind his orders he won't mind my draughts
Inattentive, absent; and distrait
Incontinency of friendship among young fellows
Indiscriminate familiarity
Inquisition
Insist upon your neither piping nor fiddling yourself
Insolent civility
It is not sufficient to deserve well; one must please well too
Know the true value of time
Known people pretend to vices they had not
Knows what things are little, and what not
Learn, if you can, the WHY and the WHEREFORE
Leave the company, at least as soon as he is wished out of it
Led, much oftener by little things than by great ones
Little failings and weaknesses
Love with him, who they think is the most in love with them
Machiavel
Mastery of one's temper
May you live as long as you are fit to live, but no longer!
May you rather die before you cease to be fit to live
Moderation with your enemies
Most people have ears, but few have judgment; tickle those ears
Never implicitly adopt a character upon common fame
Never would know anything that he had not a mind to know
No man is distrait with the man he fears, or the woman he loves
Nothing in courts is exactly as it appears to be
Our understandings are generally the DUPES of our hearts
People will repay, and with interest too, inattention
Perfection of everything that is worth doing at all
POLITICIANS NEITHER LOVE NOR HATE
Public speaking
Quietly cherished error, instead of seeking for truth
Reciprocally profess wishes which they seldom form
Reserve with your friends
Six, or at most seven hours sleep
Sooner forgive an injury than an insult
There are many avenues to every man
Those who remarkably affect any one virtue
Three passions that often put honesty to most severe trials
To great caution, you can join seeming frankness and openness
Trifling parts, with their little jargon
Truth leaves no room for compliments
We have many of those useful prejudices in this country
Whatever pleases you most in others
World is taken by the outside of things

LETTERS TO HIS SON, 1750
[LC#04][lc04sxxx.xxx]3354

What pleases you in others, will in general please them in you.

Spare the persons while you lash the crimes.

Pocket all your knowledge with your watch, and never pull it out in company unless desired: the producing of the one unasked, implies that you are weary of the company; and the producing of the other unrequired, will make the company weary of you.

People hate those who make them feel their own inferiority. Conceal all your learning carefully….

A man of the world knows the force of flattery; but then he knows how, when, and where to give it; he proportions his dose to the constitution of the patient. He flatters by application, by inference, by comparison, by hint, and seldom directly.

Absurd romances of the two last centuries
Advocate, the friend, but not the bully of virtue
Assurance and intrepidity
Attention
Author is obscure and difficult in his own language
Characters, that never existed, are insipidly displayed
Commanding with dignity, you must serve up to it with diligence
Complaisance to every or anybody's opinion
Conceal all your learning carefully
Connections
Contempt
Content yourself with mediocrity in nothing
Dance to those who pipe
Decides peremptorily upon every subject
Desire to please, and that is the main point
Desirous to make you their friend
Despairs of ever being able to pay
Difference in everything between system and practice
Dignity to be kept up in pleasures, as well as in business
Distinction between simulation and dissimulation
Do not mistake the tinsel of Tasso for the gold of Virgil
Doing what may deserve to be written
Done under concern and embarrassment, must be ill done
Dressed as the generality of people of fashion are
Economist of your time
Establishing a character of integrity and good manners
Feed him, and feed upon him at the same time
Flattery
Fortune stoops to the forward and the bold
Frivolous and superficial pertness
Gentlemen, who take such a fancy to you at first sight
Guard against those who make the most court to you
Have no pleasures but your own
If you will persuade, you must first please
Improve yourself with the old, divert yourself with the young
Indiscriminately loading their memories with every part alike
Insipid in his pleasures, as inefficient in everything else
Labor more to put them in conceit with themselves
Lay down a method for everything, and stick to it inviolably
Let blockheads read what blockheads wrote
Let nobody discover that you do know your own value
Let them quietly enjoy their errors in taste
Man is dishonored by not resenting an affront
Manner is full as important as the matter
Method
Modesty is the only sure bait when you angle for praise
Money, the cause of much mischief
More people have ears to be tickled, than understandings to judge
Most people enjoy the inferiority of their best friends
Necessity of scrupulously preserving the appearances
Never affect the character in which you have a mind to shine
Never read history without having maps
No one feels pleasure, who does not at the same time give it
Not only pure, but, like Caesar's wife, unsuspected
Often more necessary to conceal contempt than resentment
Passes for a wit, though he hath certainly no uncommon share
Patient toleration of certain airs of superiority
People hate those who make them feel their own inferiority
People lose a great deal of time by reading
Pleased with him, by making them first pleased with themselves
Pleasure is necessarily reciprocal
Pocket all your knowledge with your watch
Put out your time, but to good interest
Real merit of any kind will be discovered
Respect without timidity
Rich man never borrows
Same coolness and unconcern in any and every company
Seem to like and approve of everything at first
Sentiments that were never felt, pompously described
She has all the reading that a woman should have
She who conquers only catches a Tartar
Silence in love betrays more woe
Spare the persons while you lash the crimes
Steady assurance, with seeming modesty
Suspicion of age, no woman, let her be ever so old, ever forgive
Take the hue of the company you are with
Taking up adventitious, proves their want of intrinsic merit
The present moments are the only ones we are sure of
Those whom you can make like themselves better
Timidity and diffidence
To be heard with success, you must be heard with pleasure
To be pleased one must please
Trifle only with triflers; and be serious only with the serious
Trite jokes and loud laughter reduce him to a buffoon
Unwilling and forced; it will never please
Well dressed, not finely dressed
What is impossible, and what is only difficult
What pleases you in others, will in general please them in you
Whatever real merit you have, other people will discover
Wish you, my dear friend, as many happy new years as you deserve
Women choose their favorites more by the ear
Words are the dress of thoughts
Writing what may deserve to be read
You must be respectable, if you will be respected
Your character there, whatever it is, will get before you here

LETTERS TO HIS SON, 1751
[LC#05][lc05sxxx.xxx]3355

If you find that you have a hastiness in your temper, which unguardedly breaks out into indiscreet sallies, or rough expressions, to either your superiors, your equals, or your inferiors, watch it narrowly, check it carefully, and call the 'suaviter in modo' to your assistance: at the first impulse of passion, be silent till you can be soft.

He often is unintelligible to his readers, and sometimes so, I dare say, to himself.

"The prostrate lover, when he lowest lies,
But stoops to conquer, and but kneels to rise."

We are so made, we love to be pleased better than to be informed; information is, in a certain degree, mortifying, as it implies our previous ignorance; it must be sweetened to be palatable.

Free from the guilt: be free from the suspicion, too. Mankind, as I have often told you, are more governed by appearances than by realities; and with regard to opinion, one had better be really rough and hard, with the appearance of gentleness and softness, than just the reverse.

A favor may make an enemy, and an injury may make a friend
Affectation of business
Applauded often, without approving
At the first impulse of passion, be silent till you can be soft
Avoid cacophony, and, what is very near as bad, monotony
Be silent till you can be soft
Being intelligible is now no longer the fashion
Better refuse a favor gracefully, than to grant it clumsily
Business must be well, not affectedly dressed
Business now is to shine, not to weigh
Cease to love when you cease to be agreeable
Chit-chat, useful to keep off improper and too serious subjects
Committing acts of hostility upon the Graces
Concealed what learning I had
Consciousness of merit makes a man of sense more modest
Disagreeable things may be done so agreeably as almost to oblige
Disputes with heat
Easy without negligence
Elegance in one language will reproduce itself in all
Every man knows that he understands religion and politics
Every numerous assembly is MOB
Everybody is good for something
Expresses himself with more fire than elegance
Frank without indiscretion
Full-bottomed wigs were contrived for his humpback
Gentleness of manners, with firmness of mind
German, who has taken into his head that he understands French
Grow wiser when it is too late
Habitual eloquence
Hardened to the wants and distresses of mankind
Have you learned to carve?
If free from the guilt, be free from the suspicion, too
Inclined to be fat, but I hope you will decline it
Indolently say that they cannot do
Information implies our previous ignorance; it must be sweetened
Information is, in a certain degree, mortifying
Insinuates himself only into the esteem of fools
It is a real inconvenience to anybody to be fat
Know, yourself and others
Knowing how much you have, and how little you want
Last beautiful varnish, which raises the colors
Learn to keep your own secrets
Loved without being despised, and feared without being hated
Man of sense may be in haste, but can never be in a hurry
Mangles what he means to carve
Mazarin and Lewis the Fourteenth riveted the shackles
Meditation and reflection
Mere reason and good sense is never to be talked to a mob
Mistimes or misplaces everything
Mitigating, engaging words do by no means weaken your argument
MOB: Understanding they have collectively none
Often necessary, not to manifest all one feels
One must often yield, in order to prevail
Only because she will not, and not because she cannot
Our frivolous dissertations upon the weather, or upon whist
Outward air of modesty to all he does
Richelieu came and shackled the nation
Rochefoucault, who, I am afraid, paints man very exactly
See what you see, and to hear what you hear
Seems to have no opinion of his own
Seldom a misfortune to be childless
She has uncommon, sense and knowledge for a woman
Speaking to himself in the glass
Style is the dress of thoughts
Success turns much more upon manner than matter
Tacitus
Take characters, as they do most things, upon trust
They thought I informed, because I pleased them
Unaffected silence upon that subject is the only true medium
Unintelligible to his readers, and sometimes to himself
Use palliatives when you contradict
We love to be pleased better than to be informed
Woman like her, who has always pleased, and often been pleased
Women are the only refiners of the merit of men
Yielded commonly without conviction

LETTERS TO HIS SON, 1752