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His nobility led him to take a few steps in the direction of fortune, and then to despise her.

— Nicolas Chamfort

Il avait, par grandeur d'âme, fait quelques pas vers la fortune, et par grandeur d'âme il la méprisa.

Original text (French)

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Notes from Wikiquote

Maxims and Considerations, #548

Topics

Luck

More quotes by Nicolas Chamfort

Anyone whose needs are small seems threatening to the rich, because he’s always ready to escape their control.

There are well-dressed foolish ideas just as there are well-dressed fools.

The Cynic's Breviary : Maxims and Anecdotes from Nicolas de Chamfort (1902)

There are more fools than wise men, and even in a wise man there is more folly than wisdom.

Your intelligence often bears the same relation to your heart as the library of a château does to its owner.

The only thing that stops God sending a second Flood is that the first one was useless.

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O Fortune, cruellest of heavenly powers,
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Vicissitudes of fortune, which spares neither man nor the proudest of his works, which buries empires and cities in a common grave.

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Attribution

Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Nicolas Chamfort (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.