Nicolas Boileau-Despreaux Quotes

It is in vain a daring author thinks of attaining to the heights of Parnassus if he does not feel the secret influence of heaven and if his natal star has not formed him to be a poet.

If your descent is from heroic sires, Show in your life a remnant of their fires.

To support those of your rights authorized by Heaven, destroy everything rather than yield; that is the spirit of the Church.

Who is content with nothing possesses all things.

He who cannot limit himself will never know how to write.

No one who cannot limit himself has ever been able to write.

Gold lends a touch of beauty even to the ugly.

But satire, ever moral, ever new, Delights the reader and instructs him, too. She, if good sense refine her sterling page, Oft shakes some rooted folly of the age.

Let a single complete action, in one place and one day, keep the theatre packed to the last.

A proud bigot, who is vain enough to think that he can deceive even God by affected zeal, and throwing the veil of holiness over vices, damns all mankind by the word of his power.

Whatever we well understand we express clearly, and words flow with ease.

That which is repeated too often becomes insipid and tedious.

Nature always springs to the surface and manages to show what she is. It is vain to stop or try to drive her back. She breaks through every obstacle, pushes forward, and at last makes for herself a way.

Sometimes a fool makes a good suggestion.

Time flies and draws us with it. The moment in which I am speaking is already far from me.

When we envy another, we make their virtue our vice.

The greatest fools are oft the most satisfied.

Nothing but truth is lovely, nothing fair.

Everything that poverty touches becomes frightful.

Gold gives an appearance of beauty even to ugliness: but with poverty everything becomes frightful.

Of all the creatures that creep, swim, or fly, Peopling the earth, the waters, and the sky, From Rome to Iceland, Paris to Japan, I really think the greatest fool is man.

A burlesque word is often a powerful sermon.

Happy who in his verse can gently steer From grave to light, from pleasant to severe.

Every age has its pleasures, its style of wit, and its own ways.

Praising an honest person who doesn't deserve it, always wounds them.

In spite of every sage whom Greece can show, Unerring wisdom never dwelt below; Folly in all of every age we see, The only difference lies in the degree.

Of all the animals which fly in the air, walk on the land, or swim in the sea, from Paris to Peru, from Japan to Rome, the most foolish animal in my opinion is man.

Often the fear on one evil leads us into a worse.

Whate'er is well conceived is clearly said, And the words to say it flow with ease.

Attach yourself to those who advise you rather than praise you.

Of every four words I write, I strike out three.

Some excel in rhyme who reason foolishly.

Greatest fools are the most often satisfied.

Virtue alone is the unerring sign of a noble soul.

It is the sin which we have not committed which seems the most monstrous.

A fool can always find a greater fool who admires him.