Maxims
Richard Zeckhauser's Maxims for Analytical Thinking
La Rochefoucauld Collected Maxims
Great and brilliant deeds that dazzle the onlooker are depicted by strategists as the result of great plans, whereas they are usually the result of temperament and passion. So the war between Augustus and Antony, which is ascribed to their ambition to gain mastery of the world, may merely have been due to jealousy.
Not only are men apt to forget favors and insults; they even hate those to whom they are obliged, and stop hating those who have wronged them. Diligence in rewarding a favor and avenging a wrong seems to them a form of bondage, to which they are reluctant to escape.
The moderation of people who are fortunate comes from the calmness that good fortune gives to their temperament.
Moderation is a fear of falling prey to the envy and disdain that those who are enraptured by their own good fortune deserve: it is a vain and ostentatious display of our mental strength; and finally, the moderation of men at the height of their eminence is a desire to appear greater than their good fortune.
It takes greater virtues to bear good fortune than bad.
We often pride ourselves on our passions, even the most criminal ones; but envy is a timid, shamefaced passion, which we never dare to acknowledge.
Our evil deeds do not bring on us as much persecution and hatred as our good qualities.
If we had no faults, we would not derive so much pleasure from noting those of other people.
If we had no pride, we would not complain of it in other people.
It seems that nature, which has so wisely arranged the organs of our body for our happiness, has also given us pride to spare us the pain of knowing our deficiencies.
There is more pride than kindness in our reprimands to people who are at fault; and we reprove them not so much to correct them as to convince them that we ourselves are free from such wrongdoing.
We make promises in accordance with our hopes, and we keep them in accordance with our fears.
Self-interest speaks all kinds of languages and plays all kinds of parts—even that of disinterestedness.
Our temperament decides the value of everything brought to us by fortune.
We are never as fortunate or unfortunate as we imagine.
Those who think they have some merit treat misfortune as an honor, in order to convince other people and themselves that they are worthy of being victimized by fortune.
The philosophers’ disdain for wealth was a hidden desire to compensate their own merit for injustices of fortune, by showing contempt for the very possessions that she was keeping from them. It was a secret method of protecting themselves against the degradations of poverty; it was an indirect way of attaining the respect that they could not gain by wealth.
Our resentment at lacking favor is soothed and appeased by disdain for those who possess it; and we deny them our respect because we cannot strip them of what elicits the respect of other people.
To gain status in the world, we do all we can to appear as if we had already gained it.
No events are ever so unlucky that clever people cannot draw some advantage from them; nor are any so lucky that imprudent people cannot turn them to their own detriment.
Truth does not do so much good in the world as the appearance of it does evil.
With most men, love of justice is merely fear of suffering injustice.
It is more shameful to mistrust our friends than to be deceived by them.
Our own mistrust justifies other people’s deceptions.
Old people like to give good advice, as a consolation for the fact that they can no longer set bad examples.
One sign of exceptional merit is that those who envy it most are forced to praise it.
Nothing is less sincere than the procedure of asking for advice and giving it. The asker seems to display a respectful deference for his friend’s feelings—though his only thought is to get approval for his own, and to make the other person answerable for his conduct.
We are so accustomed to disguise ourselves from other people, that in the end we disguise ourselves from ourselves.
Habitual use of cunning is the sign of a small mind; and it nearly always happens that the person who uses it to protect himself at one point, exposes himself at another.
Very shrewd people are often arrogant, and make careless mistakes.
The sure way to be deceived is to think yourself more astute than other people.
We all have enough strength to endure the misfortunes of others.