Andre Maurois Quotes - Page 2

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

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.

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

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

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

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

A gentleman is never in a hurry.

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

Lost Illusion is the undisclosed title of every novel.

Live as if you were eternal.

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

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

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.

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

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.

A friend loves you for your intelligence, a mistress for your charm, but your family's love is unreasoning; you were born into it and are of its flesh and blood. Nevertheless it can irritate you more than any group of people in the world.

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

Old age is far more than white hair, wrinkles, the feeling that it is too late and the game finished, that the stage belongs to the rising generations. The true evil is not the weakening of the body, but the indifference of the soul.

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

If men could regard the events of their own lives with more open minds, they would frequently discover that they did not really desire the things they failed to obtain.

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

Among the idle rich, boredom is one of the most common causes of unhappiness. People who have difficulty in earning their living may suffer greatly, but they are not bored. Wealthy men and women become bored when they depend upon the theater for their enjoyment instead of making their own lives interesting.

Business is a combination of war and sport.

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

People are what you make them. A scornful look turns into a complete fool a man of average intelligence. A contemptuous indifference turns into an enemy a woman who, well treated, might have been an angel.