Everyone sees what you appear to be, few experience what you really are.
- Topic: Character, Integrity, Leadership
- Photo: Jeffrey Benjamin
More Quotes from Niccolo Machiavelli
The wise man does at once what the fool does finally.
Men in general judge more from appearances than from reality. All men have eyes, but few have the gift of penetration.
From this arises the question whether it is better to be loved rather than feared, or feared rather than loved. It might perhaps be answered that we should wish to be both: but since love and fear can hardly exist together, if we must choose between them, it is far safer to be feared than loved.
The first method of estimating the intelligence of a ruler is to look at the men he has around him.
The more sand has escaped from the hourglass of our life, the clearer we should see through it.
More on These Topics
You can tell more about a person by what he says about others, than you can by what others say about him!
Sow a thought, and you reap an act; Sow an act, and you reap a habit; Sow a habit, and you reap character; Sow a character, and you reap a destiny.
The best index to a person’s character is how he treats people who can’t do him any good, and how he treats people who can’t fight back.
Lie to a liar, for lies are his coin; steal from a thief, for that is easy; lay a trap for a trickster and catch him at first attempt, but beware of an honest man.
If it is any use to know it, I always try to write on the principle of the iceberg. There is seven-eighths of it under water for every part that shows.
If you are ever tempted to look for outside approval, realize that you have compromised your own integrity. If you need a witness, be your own.
With integrity, you have nothing to fear, since you have nothing to hide.
I have met men who are habitual liars. They have lied so long that they no longer can distinguish between the truth and a lie. Their sensitivity to sin has been almost completely deadened.
And even a liar can be scared into telling the truth, same as honest man can be tortured into telling a life.
Rest satisfied with doing well, and leave others to talk of you as they will.
You must never be fearful about what you are doing when it is right.
No man, for any considerable period, can wear one face to himself, and another to the multitude, without finally getting bewildered as to which may be true.
The heights by great men reached and kept Where not attained by sudden flight, But they, while their companions slept, Were toiling upward in the night.
The best revenge is not to be like your enemy.
Don't explain your philosophy. Embody it.
I was in darkness, but I took three steps and found myself in paradise. The first step was a good thought, the second, a good word; and the third, a good deed.
What makes night within us may leave stars.
Yesterday I was clever, so I wanted to change the world. Today I am wise, so I am changing myself.
