“The refusal of praise is only the wish to be praised twice.”

— François de La Rochefoucauld, Reflections; or Sentences and Moral Maxims, Maxim 149, 1665–1678

About François de La Rochefoucauld

1613 – 1680

French moralist, author of the "Maxims" (1665).

“Perfect courage is to do without witnesses what one would be capable of doing with the world looking on.”

“Our virtues are most frequently but vices in disguise.”

“Self-love is the greatest of all flatterers.”

“You can't depend on your eyes when your imagination is out of focus.”

“Myths are made for the imagination to breathe life into them.”

“It is in vain to dream of a wildness distant from ourselves.”

“Tell me not, in mournful numbers, life is but an empty dream!”

“I had a dream, which was not all a dream.”

“The fact is the sweetest dream that labor knows.”