Johann Kaspar Lavater Quotes - Page 5

Vanity and rudeness are seldom seen together.

Indiscretion, rashness, falsehood, levity, and malice, produce each other.

A great passion has no partner.

Calmness of will is a sign of grandeur.

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

Be not the fourth friend of him who had three before and lost them.

Those who speak always and those who never speak are equally unfit for friendship. A food proportion of the talent of listening and speaking is the base of social virtues.

The worst of faces still is human.

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

He who has no taste for order, will be often wrong in his judgment, and seldom considerate or conscientious in his actions.

Loudness is impotence.

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

He, who cannot forgive a trespass of malice to his enemy, has never yet tasted the most sublime enjoyment of love.

Conscience is wiser than science.

Happy the heart to whom God has given enough strength and courage to suffer for Him, to find happiness in simplicity and the happiness of others.

Have you ever seen a pedant with a warm heart?

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

Who gives is positive; who receives is negative; still there remains an immense class of mere passives.

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

He who can at all times sacrifice pleasure to duty approaches sublimity.

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

It is possible that a wise and good man may be prevailed on to game; but it is impossi∣ble that a professed gamester should be a wise and good man.

And still, laughter is akin to weeping.

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

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