Andre Maurois Quotes

Art is an effort to create, beside the real world, a more humane world.

Two human beings anchored to one another are like two ships shaken by waves; their carcases collide with one another and creak.

Only passions can raise a man above the level of the animal.

We owe to the Middle Ages the two worst inventions of humanity
romantic love and gunpowder.

We console ourselves with several friends for not having found one real one.

Happiness flourishes where there is happiness.

The most important quality in a leader is that of being acknowledged as such. All leaders whose fitness is questioned are clearly lacking in force.

Memory is a great artist. For every man and for every woman it makes the recollection of his or her life a work of art and an unfaithful record.

A marriage without conflicts is almost as inconceivable as a nation without crises.

Live as if you were eternal.

One might have said that reason made him flee from reason.

Advice is always a confession.

Everything that is in agreement with our personal desires
seems true. Everything that is not puts us into a rage.

For intelligent people, action often means escape from thought, but it is a reasonable and a wise escape.

The minds of different generations are as impenetrable one by the other as are the monads of Leibniz.

A gentleman is never in a hurry.

An artist must be a reactionary. He has to stand out against the tenor of the age and not go flopping along.

To reason with poorly chosen words is like using a pair of scales with inaccurate weights.

The longer the road to love, the keener is the pleasure.

Style is the hallmark of a temperament stamped upon the material at hand.

Genius consists of equal parts of natural aptitude and hard work.

If you value a man's regard, strive with him. As to liking, you like your newspaper - and despise it.

We appreciate frankness from those who like us. Frankness from others is called insolence.

No one can be profoundly original who does not avoid eccentricity.

An unsatisfied woman requires luxury, but a woman who is in love with a man will lie on a board.

A true woman loves a strong man because she knows his weaknesses. She protects as much as she is protected.

Above all things, never be afraid. The enemy who forces you to retreat is himself afraid of you at that very moment.

You don't love a man for what he says, but love what he says because you love him.

Housekeeping in common is for women the acid test.

Conversation would be vastly improved by the constant use of four simple words: I do not know.

The difficult part in an argument is not to defend one's opinion but rather to know it.

Every ten years you should delete from your mind a few ideas that your experience has proven to be false, dangerous.

I knew a man who had been virtually drowned and then revived. He said that his death had not been painful.

The art of reading is in great part that of acquiring a better understanding of life from one's encounter with it in a book.

Self-pity comes so naturally to all of us. The most solid happiness can be shaken by the compassion of a fool.

Learning is nothing without cultivated manners, but when the two are combined in a woman, you have one of the most exquisite products of civilization.

Business is a combination of war and sport.

Experience is valuable only when it has brought suffering and when the suffering has left its mark upon both body and mind.

Few are they who have never had a chance to achieve happiness- and fewer those who have taken that chance.

Men fear silence as they fear solitude, because both give them a glimpse of the terror of life's nothingness.

If you create an act, you create a habit. If you create a habit, you create a character. If you create a character, you create a destiny.

In literature as in love, we are astonished at what is chosen by others.

Our minds have unbelievable power over our bodies.

One has very little influence upon one's children. Their characters are what they are and one can do nothing to change them.

We don't love a woman for what she says, we like what she says because we love her.

Marriage makes a man more vulnerable by doubling the expanse of sail exposed to the tempests of social life.

Without a family,man,alone in the world, trembles with the cold.

It is better to teach a few things perfectly than many things indifferently.

A great statesman, like a good housekeeper, knows that cleaning has to be done every morning.

To be witty is not enough. One must possess sufficient wit to avoid having too much of it.

There are very few really brilliant men who have not had at least one madman among their ancestors.

Smile, for everyone lacks self-confidence and more than any other one thing a smile reassures them.

Novelty, the most potent of all attractions, is also the most perishable.

In a discussion, the difficulty lies, not in being able to defend your opinion, but to know it.

The art of growing old is the art of being regarded by the oncoming generations as a support and not as a stumbling-block.

All of us, from time to time, need a plunge into freedom and novelty, after which routine and discipline will seem delightful by contrast.

He who wants to do everything will never do anything.

The first recipe for happiness is: avoid too lengthy meditation on the past.

He who has found a good wife has found great happiness, but a quarrelsome woman is like a roof that lets in the rain.

A man cannot free himself from the past more easily than he can from his own body.

We can talk frankly about our defects only to those who recognise our qualities.

If, in New York, you arrive late for an appointment, say, "I took a taxi".

When you become used to never being alone, you may consider yourself Americanised

The life of a couple is lived on the mental level of the more mediocre of the two beings who compose it.

There are certain persons for whom pure Truth is a poison.

Men and women are not born inconstant: they are made so by their early amorous experiences.

Growing old is no more than a bad habit which a busy person has no time to form.

The really great novel tends to be the exact negative of its author's life.

Medicine is a very old joke, but it still goes on.

Ne dites pas trop de mal de vous-meme: on vous croirait. - Don't talk too badly of yourself: they ight believe you.

Style is the outcome of constraint.

There are deserts in every life, and the desert must be depicted if we are to give a fair and complete idea of the country.

Modesty and unselfishness - these are the virtues which men praise - and pass by.

We are almost always the craftsman of our own unhappiness.

Love born of anxiety resembles a thorn shaped so that efforts to pull it out of one's flesh merely cause it to penetrate more deeply therein.

A great man's manias must be respected, because the time required to combat them is too precious to waste.

Sincerity is glass, discretion is diamond.

The reading of a fine book is an uninterrupted dialogue in which the book speaks and our soul replies.

Time is a factor in all action. An imperfect scheme put into action at the proper time is better than a perfect one accomplished too late.

[ ... ] marriage is one thing, and love is another ... You need to have a solid canvas; nobody stops you to weave the arabesques ...

The effectiveness of work increases according to geometric progression if there are no interruptions.

A happy marriage is a long conversation which always seems too short.

People are discontent; men are troubled; and the literature is excellent.

A successful marriage is an edifice that must be rebuilt every day.

Inspiration in matters of taste will not come twice.

Happiness is never there to stay [ ... ] Happiness is merely a respite offered by inquietude.