Baltasar Gracián Quotes

104 Sourced Quotes

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.

Baltasar Gracián
Don't express your ideas too clearly. Most people think little of what they understand, and venerate what they do not.

Baltasar Gracián
The sole advantage of power is that you can do more good.

Baltasar Gracián
Sometimes it proves the highest understanding not to understand.

Baltasar Gracián
In conversation, discretion is more importance than eloquence.

Baltasar Gracián
You have to appear wiser and more prudent than is required by the people you are dealing with if you want to give a high opinion of yourself.

Baltasar Gracián
Always leave something to wish for; otherwise you will be miserable from your very happiness.

Baltasar Gracián
If there is too much display today there will be nothing to show tomorrow. Always have some novelty with which to dazzle.

Baltasar Gracián
One should cultivate good habits of memory, for it is capable of making existence a Paradise or an Inferno.

Baltasar Gracián
It is better to sleep on things beforehand than to lie awake about them afterward.

Baltasar Gracián
The best remedy for disturbances is to let them run their course, for so they quiet down.

Baltasar Gracián
Always have your mouth full of sugar to sweeten your words, so that even your ill-wishers enjoy them.

Baltasar Gracián
Freedom is more precious than the gift that makes us lose it.

Baltasar Gracián
Politeness and a sense of honor have this advantage: we bestow them on others without losing a thing.

Baltasar Gracián
Knowledge and courage. These are the elements of greatness. Because they are immortal they bestow immortality. Each is as much as he knows, and the wise can do anything. A person without knowledge is in world without light. Wisdom and strength are the eyes and hands. Knowledge without courage is sterile.

Baltasar Gracián
Know how to choose well. Most of life depends thereon. It needs good taste and correct judgment, for which neither intellect nor study suffices.

Baltasar Gracián
Because the ignorant do not know themselves, they never know for what they are lacking. Some would be sages if they did not believe they were so already.

Baltasar Gracián
Some die because they feel everything, others because they feel nothing. Some are fools because they suffer no regrets, and others because they do.

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

Baltasar Gracián
The happy are an exception who enjoy innocently their simple happiness.

Baltasar Gracián
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, and at eighty nothing.

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

Baltasar Gracián
Those who insist on the dignity of their office show they have not deserved it, and that it is too much for them.

Baltasar Gracián
Some marry the first information they receive, and turn what comes later into their concubine. Since deceit is always first to arrive, there is no room left for truth.

Baltasar Gracián
Knowing how to keep a friend is more important than gaining a new one.

Baltasar Gracián
When you counsel someone, you should appear to be reminding him of something he had forgotten, not of the light he was unable to see.

Baltasar Gracián
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.

Baltasar Gracián
Many pleasant things are better when they belong to someone else. … When things belong to others, we enjoy them twice as much, without the risk of losing them, and with the pleasure of novelty.

Baltasar Gracián
Not believing others implies that you yourself are deceitful. The liar suffers twice: he neither believes nor is believed.

Baltasar Gracián
Never risk your reputation on a single trial, because if it does not turn out well, the damage will be irreparable.

Baltasar Gracián