Johann Kaspar Lavater Quotes.
Action, looks, words, steps, form the alphabet by which you may spell character.
If you wish to appear agreeable in society, you must consent to be taught many things which you know already.
Intuition is the clear conception of the whole at once.
The countenance is more eloquent than the tongue.
The jealous are possessed by a mad devil and a dull spirit at the same time.
A fop of fashion is the mercer’s friend, the tailor’s fool, and his own foe.
You may depend upon it that he is a good man whose intimate friends are all good, and whose enemies are decidedly bad.
There are no friends more inseparable than pride and hardness of heart, humility and love, falsehood and impudence.
The great rule of moral conduct is next to God, respect time.
The prudent see only the difficulties, the bold only the advantages, of a great enterprise; the hero sees both; diminishes the former and makes the latter preponderate, and so conquers.
The conscience is more wise than science.
He who sedulously attends, pointedly asks, calmly speaks, coolly answers and ceases when he has no more to say is in possession of some of the best requisites of man
Depend on no man, on no friend but him who can depend on himself. He only who acts conscientiously toward himself, will act so toward others.
Him, who incessantly laughs in the street, you may commonly hear grumbling in his closet.
Who in the same given time can produce more than others has vigor; who can produce more and better, has talents; who can produce what none else can, has genius.
Who is open without levity; generous without waste; secret without craft; humble without meanness; bold without insolence; cautious without anxiety; regular, yet not formal; mild, yet not timid; firm, yet not tyrannical – is made to pass the ordeal of honour, friendship, virtue.
There are three classes of men; the retrograde, the stationary and the progressive.
Neatness begets order; but from order to taste there is the same difference as from taste to genius, or from love to friendship.
Mistrust the person who finds everything good, and the person who finds everything evil, and mistrust even more the person who is indifferent to everything.
Know in the first place, that mankind agree in essence, as they do in limbs and senses.
Have you ever seen a pedant with a warm heart?
He also has energy who cannot be deprived of it.
Conscience is the sentinel of virtue.
I am prejudiced in favor of him who, without impudence, can ask boldly. He has faith in humanity, and faith in himself. No one who is not accustomed to giving grandly can ask nobly and with boldness.
Truth, wisdom, love, seek reasons; malice only seeks causes.
A beautiful smile is to the female countenance what the sunbeam is to the landscape; it embellishes an inferior face and redeems an ugly one.
The public seldom forgive twice.
The acquisition of will, for one thing exclusively, presupposes entire acquaintance with many others.
He who can conceal his joys, is greater than he who can hide his griefs
He who seldom speaks, and with one calm well-timed word can strike dumb the loquacious, is a genius or a hero.
Avoid the eye that discovers with rapidity the bad, and is slow to see the good.
Mistrust the man who finds everything good, the man who finds everything evil and still more the man who is indifferent to everything.
Don’t speak evil of someone if you don’t know for certain, and if you do know ask yourself, why am I telling it?
If you see one cold and vehement at the same time, set him down for a fanatic.
What do I owe to my times, to my country, to my neighbors, to my friends? Such are the questions which a virtuous man ought often to ask himself.
