The world oftener rewards the appearance of merit than merit itself.
Le monde récompense plus souvent les apparences de mérite que le mérite même.
Original text (French)
Original text (French)
To succeed in the world we do everything we can to appear successful already.
We hardly find any persons of good sense save those who agree with us.
We all have strength enough to endure the misfortunes of others.
Truth does not do so much good in the world, as the appearance of it does evil.
All François de La Rochefoucauld quotes →
Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: François de La Rochefoucauld (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.