André Maurois Love Quotes and Sayings
2. We owe to the Middle Ages the two worst inventions of humanity – romantic love and gunpowder.
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Excerpt from Wikipedia: André Maurois, born Emile Salomon Wilhelm Herzog, (26 July 1885, Elbeuf, Seine-Maritime – 9 October 1967) was a French author.
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Sayings by André Maurois
1. A happy marriage is a long conversation which always seems too short.
2. Writing is a difficult trade which must be learned slowly by reading great authors; by trying at the outset to imitate them; by daring then to be original; by destroying one’s first productions.
3. Smile, for everyone lacks self-confidence and more than any other one thing a smile reassures them.
4. A successful marriage is an edifice that must be rebuilt every day.
5. A marriage without conflicts is almost as inconceivable as a nation without crises.
6. An artist must be a reactionary. He has to stand out against the tenor of the age and not go flopping along.
7. Conversation would be vastly improved by the constant use of four simple words: I do not know.
8. Growing old is no more than a bad habit which a busy person has no time to form.
9. If men could regard the events of their own lives with more open minds, they would frequently discover that they did not really desire the things they failed to obtain.
10. If you create an act, you create a habit. If you create a habit, you create a character. If you create a character, you create a destiny.
11. Without a family, man, alone in the world, trembles with the cold.
12. If, in New York, you arrive late for an appointment, say, “I took a taxi.”
13. Self-pity comes so naturally to all of us. The most solid happiness can be shaken by the compassion of a fool.
14. Modesty and unselfishness – these are the virtues which men praise – and pass by.
15. No one can be profoundly original who does not avoid eccentricity.
16. Old age is far more than white hair, wrinkles, the feeling that it is too late and the game finished, that the stage belongs to the rising generations. The true evil is not the weakening of the body, but the indifference of the soul.
17. People are what you make them. A scornful look turns into a complete fool a man of average intelligence. A contemptuous indifference turns into an enemy a woman who, well treated, might have been an angel.
18. Art is an effort to create, beside the real world, a more human world.
19. The effectiveness of work increases according to geometric progression if there are no interruptions.
20. The first recipe for happiness is: Avoid too lengthy meditation on the past.
21. To be witty is not enough. One must possess sufficient wit to avoid having too much of it.
22. Often we allow ourselves to be upset by small things we should despise and forget. We lose many irreplaceable hours brooding over grievances that, in a year’s time, will be forgotten by us and by everybody. No, let us devote our life to worthwhile actions and feelings, to great thoughts, real affections and enduring undertakings.