Baltasar Gracian

To oblige persons often costs little and helps much.

He that communicates his secret to another makes himself that other's slave.

It is better to sleep on things beforehand than lie awake about them afterwards.

He that can live alone resembles the brute beast in nothing, the sage in much, and God in everything.

Those who insist on the dignity of their office show they have not deserved it.

Don't take the wrong side of an argument just because your opponent has taken the right side.

He that has satisfied his thirst turns his back on the well.

Let the first impulse pass, wait for the second.

There is always time to add a word, never to withdraw one.

Advice is sometimes transmitted more successfully through a joke than grave teaching.

Aspire rather to be a hero than merely appear one.

There is none who cannot teach somebody something, and there is none so excellent but he is excelled.

Things do not pass for what they are, but for what they seem. Most things are judged by their jackets.

It is better to have too much courtesy than too little, provided you are not equally courteous to all, for that would be injustice.

Many have had their greatness made for them by their enemies.

It is a great piece of skill to know how to guide your luck even while waiting for it.

To be at ease is better than to be at business. Nothing really belongs to us but time, which even he has who has nothing else.

Hope is a great falsifier. Let good judgment keep her in check.

Evil report carries further than any applause.

I strive to be brief, and I become obscure.

Luck can be assisted. It is not all chance with the wise.

Even knowledge has to be in the fashion, and where it is not, it is wise to affect ignorance.

It is good to vary in order that you may frustrate the curious, especially those who envy you.

Fortune pays you sometimes for the intensity of her favors by the shortness of their duration. She soon tires of carrying any one long on her shoulders.

Hope has a good memory, gratitude a bad one.

One must pass through the circumference of time before arriving at the center of opportunity.

When desire dies, fear is born.

Work is the price which is paid for reputation.

Quit while you're ahead. All the best gamblers do.

The things we remember best are those better forgotten.

We often have to put up with most from those on whom we most depend.

A man of honour should never forget what he is because he sees what others are.

Begin with another's to end with your own.

A beautiful woman should break her mirror early.

A single lie destroys a whole reputation of integrity.

Respect yourself if you would have others respect you.

A wise man gets more use from his enemies than a fool from his friends.

The envious die not once, but as oft as the envied win applause.

At twenty a man is a peacock, at thirty a lion, at forty a camel, at fifty a serpent, at sixty a dog, at seventy an ape, at eighty a nothing at all.

Never contend with a man who has nothing to lose.

Don't show off every day, or you'll stop surprising people. There must always be some novelty left over. The person who displays a little more of it each day keeps up expectations, and no one ever discovers the limits of his talent.

Attempt easy tasks as if they were difficult, and difficult as if they were easy; in the one case that confidence may not fall asleep, in the other that it may not be dismayed.

Little said is soon amended. There is always time to add a word, never to withdraw one.

Have friends. 'Tis a second existence.

Never open the door to a lesser evil, for other and greater ones invariably slink in after it.

True knowledge lies in knowing how to live.

Fortunate people often have very favorable beginnings and very tragic endings. What matters isn't being applauded when you arrive - for that is common - but being missed when you leave.

Be content to act, and leave the talking to others.

To equal a predecessor, one must have twice they worth.

Never do anything when you are in a temper, for you will do everything wrong.