Johann Kaspar Lavater famous quotes

Who makes quick use of the moment is a genius of prudence.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Opportunity #Genius #Use

Him, who incessantly laughs in the street, you may commonly hear grumbling in his closet.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Laughter #Laughing #Grumbling

Be certain that he who has betrayed thee once will betray thee again.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Betrayal #Betrayed #Thee

Mistrust the man who finds everything good, the man who finds everything evil and still more the man who is indifferent to everything.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Inspirational #Men #Evil

The jealous are possessed by a mad devil and a dull spirit at the same time.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Jealousy #Time #Mad

Don't speak evil of someone if you don't know for certain, and if you do know ask yourself, why am I telling it?
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Evil #Gossip #Speak

What do I owe to my times, to my country, to my neighbors, to my friends? Such are the questions which a virtuous man ought often to ask himself.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Country #Men #Neighbor

I am prejudiced in favor of him who, without impudence, can ask boldly. He has faith in humanity, and faith in himself. No one who is not accustomed to giving grandly can ask nobly and with boldness.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Giving #Humanity #Favors

You may depend upon it that he is a good man whose intimate friends are all good, and whose enemies are decidedly bad.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Men #Good Man #Enemy

He who seldom speaks, and with one calm well-timed word can strike dumb the loquacious, is a genius or a hero.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Time #Stupid #Hero

The public seldom forgive twice.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Forgiving #Society

Let the degree of egotism be the measure of confidence.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Degrees #Egotism

A fop of fashion is the mercer's friend, the tailor's fool, and his own foe.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Fashion #Tailors #Fool

Desire is the uneasiness a man finds in himself upon the absence of anything whose present enjoyment carries the idea of delight with it.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Men #Ideas #Desire

He who prorogues the honesty of today till to-morrow will probably prorogue his to-morrows to eternity.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Honesty #Delay #Today

All finery is a sign of littleness.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

Nothing is so pregnant as cruelty; so multifarious, so rapid, so ever teeming a mother is unknown to the animal kingdom; each of her experiments provokes another and refines upon the last; though always progressive, yet always remote from the end.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Mother #Animal #Cuckoos

The cruelty of the effeminate is more dreadful than that or the hardy.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Cruelty #Hardy

The creditor whose appearance gladdens the heart of a debtor may hold his head in sunbeams and his foot on storms.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Heart #Feet #Storm

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.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Listening #Talent #Speak

Beware of biting jests; the more truth they carry with them, the greater wounds they give, the greater smarts they cause, and the greater scars they leave behind them.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Smart #Giving #Biting

The conscience is more wise than science.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Wise #Conscience

Say not you know another entirely till you have divided an inheritance with him.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Inheritance

Trust him not with your secrets, who, when left alone in your room, turns over your papers.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Trust #Secret #Rooms

Good-humor is always a success.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Good Humor

Who gives a trifle meanly is meaner than the trifle.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Giving #Trifles

Borrowed wit is the poorest wit.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Imitation #Wit

A gift--its kind, its value and appearance; the silence or the pomp that attends it; the style in which it reaches you--may decide the dignity or vulgarity of the giver.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Silence #Style #May

The proportion of genius to the vulgar is like one to a million.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Genius #Proportion #Vulgar

It is possible that a wise and good man may be prevailed on to game; but it is impossible that a professed gamester should be a wise and good man.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Wise #Men #Gambling

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

#Forgiveness #Embrace #Divine

Receive no satisfaction for premeditated impertinence; forget it, forgive it, but keep him inexorably at a distance who offered it.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Forgiveness #Distance #Forgiving

Evasions are the common shelter of the hard-hearted, the false and impotent when called upon to assist; the really great alone plan instantaneous help, even when their looks or words presage difficulties.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Looks #Shelter #Helping

Just so far as we are pleased at finding faults, are we displeased at finding perfection.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Envy #Perfection #Faults

As the interest of man, so his God; as his God, so he.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Men #Interest

Whatever obscurities may involve religious tenets, humility and love constitute the essence of true religion; the humble is formed to adore, the loving to associate with eternal love.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Religious #Humble #Humility

The more any one speaks of himself, the less he likes to hear another talked of.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Likes #Speak #Conceit

The freer you feel yourself in the presence of another, the more free is he.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Feels

He, who boldly interposes between a merciless censor and his prey, is a man of vigor: and he who, mildly wise, without wounding, convinces him of his error, commands our veneration.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Wise #Men #Errors

Dread more the blunderer's friendship than the calumniator's enmity.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Friendship #Enmity #Dread

Three things characterize man: person, fate, merit--the harmony of these constitutes real grandeur.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Real #Fate #Men

Who despises all that is despicable is made to be impressed with all that is grand.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Made #Despise

Man is forever the same; the same under every form, in all situations and relations that admit of free and unrestrained exertion. The same regard which you have for yourself, you have for others, for nature, for the invisible ... which you call God.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Men #Forever #Invisible

Decided ends are sure signs of a decided character.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Character #Ends

Who begins with severity, in judging of another, ends commonly with falsehood.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Judging #Ends #Falsehood

Where consequence ceases, there folly, restlessness and misery begin.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Misery #Folly #Consequence

Who is fatal to others is so to himself.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

Who cuts is easily wounded. The readier you are to offend the sooner you are offended.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Cutting #Wounded #Offended

The quicker, the louder, the applause with which another tries to gain you over to his purpose--the bitterer his censure if he miss his aim.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Missing #Trying #Purpose

Who has witnessed one free and unconstrained act of yours, has witnessed all.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

Humility with energy is often mistaken for pride.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Humility #Pride #Energy

You can depend on no man, on no friend, but him who can depend on himself.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Men #No Friends

She whom smiles and tears make equally lovely may command all hearts.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Heart #Lovely #Tears

His calumny is not only the greatest benefit a rogue can confer on us, but the only service he will perform for nothing.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Benefits #Rogues #Calumny

Loudness is impotence.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

He who comes from the kitchen, smells of its smoke; and he who adheres to a sect, has something of its cant; the college air pursues the student; and dry inhumanity him who herds with literary pedants.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#College #Air #Smell

The enemy of art is the enemy of nature; art is nothing but the highest sagacity and exertions of human nature; and what nature will he honor who honors not the human?
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Art #Honor #Enemy

He submits himself to be seen through a microscope, who suffers himself to be caught in a fit of passion.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Anger #Passion #Suffering

How few our real wants, and how vast our imaginary ones!
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Real #Want #Imaginary

Thinkers are scarce as gold; but he whose thoughts embrace all his subject, and who pursues it uninterruptedly and fearless of consequences, is a diamond of enormous size.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Fearless #Gold #Size

If you mean to know yourself, interline such of these aphorisms as affect you agreeably in reading, and set a mark to such as left a sense of uneasiness with you; and then show your copy to whom you please.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Reading #Mean #Aphorism

Venerate four characters: the sanguine who has checked volatility and the rage for pleasure; the choleric who has subdued passion and pride; the phlegmatic emerged from indolence; and the melancholy who has dismissed avarice, suspicion and asperity.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Passion #Character #Pride

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.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Heart #Simplicity #Suffering

Avoid the eye that discovers with rapidity the bad, and is slow to see the good.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Eye

Who partakes in another's joys is a more humane character than he who partakes in his griefs.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Grief #Character #Joy

Kiss the hand of him who can renounce what he has publicly taught, when convicted of his error; and who, with heartfelt joy, embraces the truth, though with the sacrifice of favorite opinions.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Happiness #Art #Truth

Close thine ear against him that shall open his mouth secretly against another. If thou receivest not his words, they fly back and wound the reporter. If thou dost receive them, they fly forward and wound the receiver.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Ears #Mouths #Slander

Every man has his devilish minutes.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Men #Sin #Minutes

The true friend of truth and good loves them under all forms, but he loves them most under the most simple form.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#True Friend #Good Love #Simple

Not every one who has the gift of speech understands the value of silence.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Silence #Speech #Values

He knows not how to speak who cannot be silent; still less how to act with vigor and decision. Who hastens to the end is silent; loudness is impotence.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Silence #Decision #Vigor

Who, in the midst of just provocation to anger, instantly finds the fit word which settles all around him in silence is more than wise or just; he is, were he a beggar, of more than royal blood, he is of celestial descent.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Wise #Blood #Silence

He who is passionate and hasty is generally honest. It is your cool, dissembling hypocrite of whom you should beware.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Passion #Hypocrite #Honest

In the society of ladies, want of sense is not so unpardonable as want of manners.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Want #Manners

As a man's salutations, so is the total of his character; in nothing do we lay ourselves so open as in our manner of meeting and salutation.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Character #Men #Manners

True love, like the eye, can bear no flaw.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Love #Eye #Bears

An entirely honest man, in the severe sense of the word, exists no more than an entirely dishonest knave; the best and the worst are only approximations to those qualities. Who are those that never contradict themselves? yet honesty never contradicts itself. Who are they that always contradict themselves? yet knavery is mere self-contradiction. Thus the knowledge of man determines not the things themselves, but their proportions, the quantum of congruities and incongruities.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Honesty #Men #Self

A beautiful smile is to the female countenance what the sunbeam is to the landscape; it embellishes an inferior face and redeems an ugly one.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Beautiful #Female #Ugly

Softness of smile indicates softness of character.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Character #Softness

What is the elevation of the soul? A prompt, delicate, certain feeling for all that is beautiful, all that is grand; a quick resolution to do the greatest good by the smallest means; a great benevolence joined to a great strength and great humility.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Beautiful #Mean #Humility

Words are the wings of actions.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Wings #Action

Sensibility is the power of woman.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Women #Sensibility

Wisdom is the repose of the mind.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Wisdom #Mind

He whom common, gross, or stale objects allure, and when obtained, content, is a vulgar being, incapable of greatness in thought or action.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Greatness #Action #Common

Vanity and rudeness are seldom seen together.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Vanity #Together #Rudeness

She neglects her heart who too closely studies her glass.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Heart #Vanity #Glasses

Have I done aught of value to my fellow-men? Then have I done much for myself.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Men #Done #Fellow Man

The man who loves with his whole heart truth will love still more he who suffers for truth.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Truth #Heart #Men

Women are proverbially credulous.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Trust

Each particle of matter is an immensity, each leaf a world, each insect an inexplicable compendium.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#World #Matter #Inexplicable

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

#Inspire #Mind #Superstitions

Habit is altogether too arbitrary a master for me to submit to.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Arbitrary #Habit #Masters

He who, in questions of right, virtue, or duty, sets himself above all ridicule, is truly great, and shall laugh in the end with truer mirth than ever he was laughed at.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Greatness #Laughing #Mirth

There are no friends more inseparable than pride and hardness of heart, humility and love, falsehood and impudence.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Heart #Humility #Pride

The policy of adapting one's self to circumstances makes all ways smooth.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Self #Way #Smooth

He who seeks to imbitter innocent pleasure has a cancer in his heart.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Cancer #Heart #Innocent

The affectation of sanctity is a blotch on the face of piety.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Faces #Sanctity #Piety

What knowledge is there of which man is capable that is not founded on the exterior,--the relation that exists between visible and invisible, the perceptible and the imperceptible?
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Men #Invisible #Relation

True philosophy is that which renders us to ourselves, and all others who surround us, better, and at the same time more content, more patient, more calm and more ready for all decent and pure enjoyment.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Philosophy #Calm #Patient

The mingled incentives which lead to action are often too subtle and lie too deep for us to analyze.
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater

#Lying #Incentives #Action