Baltasar Gracián - The Art of Worldly Wisdom

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The one rule for pleasing: whet the appetite, keep people hungry.

Baltasar Gracián
Share weight and woe, for misfortune falls with double force on him that stands alone.

Baltasar Gracián
Everything foreign is respected, partly because it comes from afar, partly because it is ready made and perfect.

Baltasar Gracián
Display startling novelty-rise afresh like the sun every day. Change too the scene on which you shine, so that you rloss may be felt in the old scenes of your triumph, while the novelty of your powers wins applause in the new.

Baltasar Gracián
The true way is the middle one, halfway between deserving a place and pushing oneself into it.

Baltasar Gracián
Most do violence to their natural aptitude, and thus attain superiority in nothing.

Baltasar Gracián
Know how to use evasion. That is how smart people get out of difficulties.

Baltasar Gracián
The sage never seems to know his own merits, for only by not noticing them can you call others' attention to them.

Baltasar Gracián
There must be something good in a thing that pleases so many; even if it cannot be explained, it is certainly enjoyed.

Baltasar Gracián
The greatest fool is he who thinks he is not one and all others are.

Baltasar Gracián
We have more days to live through than pleasures. Be slow in enjoyment, quick at work, for men see work ended with pleasure, pleasure ended with regret.

Baltasar Gracián
Great ability develops and reveals itself increasingly with every new assignment.

Baltasar Gracián
Honorable beginnings should serve to awaken curiosity, not to heighten people's expectations. We are much better off when reality surpasses our expectations, and something turns out better than we thought it would. This rule does not hold true for bad things: when an evil has been exaggerated, its reality makes people applaud. What was feared as ruinous comes to seem tolerable.

Baltasar Gracián
The right kind of leisure is better than the wrong kind of work.

Baltasar Gracián
Nothing arouses ambition so much in the heart as the trumpet-clang of another's fame.

Baltasar Gracián
What is not seen is as if it was not. Even the Right does not receive proper consideration if it does not seem right.

Baltasar Gracián
Nature scarcely ever gives us the very best; for that we must have recourse to art.

Baltasar Gracián
To hear a prince's secrets is not a privilege but a burden. Many smash the mirror that reminds them of their ugliness. They cannot stand to see those who saw them.

Baltasar Gracián
Those who want to look like hard workers give the impression that they aren't up to their jobs.

Baltasar Gracián
A brand new mediocrity is thought more of than accustomed excellence.

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

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

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

Baltasar Gracián