Francois de La Rochefoucauld Merit Quotations

There is merit without rank, but there is no rank without some merit.

Love, all agreeable as it is, charms more by the fashion in which it displays itself, than by its own true merit.

There are two sorts of constancy in love one arises from continually discovering in the loved person new subjects for love, the other arises from our making a merit of being constant.

Honest people will respect us for our merit: the public, for our luck.

There are people who in spite of their merit disgust us and others who please us in spite of their faults.

The world more often rewards the appearances of merit than merit itself.

Some people displease with merit, and others' very faults and defects are pleasing.

The appearances of goodness and merit often meet with a greater reward from the world than goodness and merit themselves.

The mark of extraordinary merit is to see those most envious of it constrained to praise.

Nature makes merit, and fortune puts it to work.

Our merit gains us the esteem of the virtuous-our star that of the public.