Johann Kaspar Lavater quotes: wise famous quotes, sayings and quotations by Johann Kaspar Lavater

Johann Kaspar Lavater Famous Quotes & Sayings

Discover top inspirational quotes from Johann Kaspar Lavater on Wise Famous Quotes.

If you wish to appear agreeable in society, you must consent to be taught many things which you know already.

Where there is much pretension, much has been borrowed; nature never pretends.

If you see one cold and vehement at the same time, set him down for a fanatic.

God protects those he loves from worthless reading.

Where consequence ceases, there folly, restlessness and misery begin.

He is incapable of a truly good action who finds not a pleasure in contemplating the good actions of others.

He who can conceal his joys, is greater than he who can hide his griefs

And still, laughter is akin to weeping.

The acquisition of will, for one thing exclusively, presupposes entire acquaintance with many others.

Who cuts is easily wounded. The readier you are to offend the sooner you are offended.

All belief that does not make us more happy, more free, more loving, more active, more calm, is, I fear, a mistaken and superstitious belief.

Half talent is no talent.

Dread more the blunderer's friendship than the calumniator's enmity.

The humblest star twinkles most in the darkest night.

Too much gravity argues a shallow mind.

Strange that cowards cannot see that their greatest safety lies in dauntless courage.

You may tell a man thou art a fiend, but not your nose wants blowing; to him alone who can bear a thing of that kind, you may tell all.

There is a manner of forgiveness so divine that you are ready to embrace the offender for having called it forth.

Good-humor is always a success.

He who is passionate and hasty is generally honest. It is your cool, dissembling hypocrite of whom you should beware.

Who despises all that is despicable is made to be impressed with all that is grand.

True love, like the eye, can bear no flaw.

The public seldom forgive twice.

Who recollects distinctly his past adventures, knows his destiny to come.

Avoid the eye that discovers with rapidity the bad, and is slow to see the good.

Who trades in contradictions will not be contradicted.

Neither refinement nor delicacy is indispensable to produce elegance.

Don't speak evil of someone if you don't know for certain, and if you do know ask yourself, why am I telling it?

He scatters enjoyment who can enjoy much.

He who reforms himself has done more towards reforming the public than a crowd or noisy, impotent patriots.

It is a poor wit who lives by borrowing the words, decisions, mien, inventions and actions of others.

The affectation of sanctity is a blotch on the face of piety.

His calumny is not only the greatest benefit a rogue can confer on us, but the only service he will perform for nothing.

Who affects useless singularities has surely a little mind.

Receive no satisfaction for premeditated impertinence; forget it, forgive it, but keep him inexorably at a distance who offered it.

The more uniform a man's voice, step, manner of conversation, handwriting
the more quiet, uniform, settled, his actions, his character.

Be certain that he who has betrayed thee once will betray thee again.

She whom smiles and tears make equally lovely may command all hearts.

He can feel no little wants who is in pursuit of grandeur.

A fop of fashion is the mercer's friend, the tailor's fool, and his own foe.

There is no mortal truly wise and restless at once; wisdom is the repose of minds.

Let none turn over books, or roam the stars in quest of God, who sees him not in man.

As man's love or hatred, so he. Love and hatred exist only personified.

Loudness is impotence.

Just so far as we are pleased at finding faults, are we displeased at finding perfection.

The craftiest trickery are too short and ragged a cloak to cover a bad heart.

He has oratory who ravishes his hearers while he forgets himself.

Who has a daring eye tell downright truths and downright lies.

He whom common, gross, or stale objects allure, and when obtained, content, is a vulgar being, incapable of greatness in thought or action.

Fools learn nothing from wise men, but wise men learn much from fools.

In the society of ladies, want of sense is not so unpardonable as want of manners.

The jealous are possessed by a mad devil and a dull spirit at the same time.

The loss of taste for what is right is loss of all right taste.

He who, silent, loves to be with us - he who loves us in our silence - has touched one of the keys that ravish hearts.

Who, under pressing temptations to lie, adheres to truth, nor to the profane betrays aught of a sacred trust, is near the summit of wisdom and virtue.

As you treat your body, so your house, your domestics, your enemies, your friends. Dress is a table of your contents.

Vociferation and calmness of character seldom meet in the same person.

Who is respectable when thinking himself alone and free from observation will be so before the eye of all the world.

Be neither too early in the fashion, nor too long out of it; nor at any time in the extremes of it.

You can depend on no man, on no friend, but him who can depend on himself.

Who is fatal to others is so to himself.

The mingled incentives which lead to action are often too subtle and lie too deep for us to analyze.

Know in the first place, that mankind agree in essence, as they do in limbs and senses.

Mistrust the man who finds everything good, the man who finds everything evil and still more the man who is indifferent to everything.

Vanity and rudeness are seldom seen together.

The conscience is more wise than science.

All affectation is the vain and ridiculous attempt of poverty to appear rich

Where pride begins, love ceases.

Not every one who has the gift of speech understands the value of silence.

Who begins with severity, in judging of another, ends commonly with falsehood.

The less you can enjoy, the poorer, the scantier yourself,
the more you can enjoy, the richer, the more vigorous.

The more any one speaks of himself, the less he likes to hear another talked of.

A single spark of occasion discharges the child of passions into a thousand crackers of desire.

He submits to be seen through a microscope, who suffers himself to be caught in a fit of passion.

What do I owe to my times, to my country, to my neighbors, to my friends? Such are the questions which a virtuous man ought often to ask himself.

Superstition always inspires littleness, religion grandeur of mind; the superstitious raises beings inferior to himself to deities.

Depend on no man, on no friend but him who can depend on himself. He only who acts conscientiously toward himself, will act so toward others.

Words are the wings of actions.

Defeat serves to enlighten us.

Softness of smile indicates softness of character.

Intuition is the clear conception of the whole at once.

Modesty is silent when it would be improper to speak; the humble, without being called upon, never recollects to say anything of himself.

As your enemies and your friends, so are you

The proportion of genius to the vulgar is like one to a million.

Who partakes in another's joys is a more humane character than he who partakes in his griefs.

Thinkers are as scarce as gold.

He who prorogues the honesty of today till to-morrow will probably prorogue his to-morrows to eternity.

Borrowed wit is the poorest wit.

Wisdom is the repose of the mind.

He who seeks to imbitter innocent pleasure has a cancer in his heart.

How few our real wants, and how vast our imaginary ones!

As a man's salutations, so is the total of his character; in nothing do we lay ourselves so open as in our manner of meeting and salutation.

To know yourself you have only to set down a true statement of those that ever loved or hated you.

Desire is the uneasiness a man finds in himself upon the absence of anything whose present enjoyment carries the idea of delight with it.

He who goes round about in his requests wants commonly more than he chooses to appear to want.

He whose pride oppresses the humble may perhaps be humbled, but will never be humble.

Avoid him who from mere curiosity asks three questions running about a thing that cannot interest Him.

Dress is an index of your contents.

Him, who incessantly laughs in the street, you may commonly hear grumbling in his closet.

The smiles that encourage severity of judgment hide malice and insincerity.