Honore de Balzac Quotes

Oh, 'tis not my qualities they object to! 'Tis my lack of vice.

Be virtuous and you will be vicious.

We do not despise all those who have vices, but we do despise those that have no virtue.

A man given to vice is always an idealist.

There is some virtue in almost every vice, except hypocrisy; and even that, while it is a mockery of virtue, is at the same time a compliment to it.

Bourgeois morality is largely a system of making cheap virtues a cloak for expensive vices.

History teaches us virtue, but nature never ceases to teachh us vice.

To all the rest of his Absurdities, (for vice is always unreasonable,) he adds one more, who expects that Vertue from another which he won't practise himself.

The virtue of some people consists wholly in condemning the vices in others.

Virtue has a veil, vice a mask.

Many a thief is a better man than many a clergyman, and miles nearer to the gate of the kingdom.

Hypocrisy is not generally a social sin, but a virtue.

Immorality: the morality of those who are having a better time.

You can be brilliant in some ways and despicable in others. You can be a clean, upright, moral individual in your private life who never swears, treats women with respect, and speaks highly of duty and honor - and go out every day and dedicate yourself to a cause that makes the world worse.

President Trump's critics call him an immoral lout. By strict moral standards, so are we all.

Hypocrisy is an homage that vice renders to virtue.

Prudence is a quality incompatible with vice, and can never be effectively enlisted in its cause.

He, who practices right, but in the hope of acquiring great renown, is very near to vice.

Virtue sometimes pretends. Vice is always sincere.

Loud indignation against vice often stands for virtue in the eyes of bigots.

Vices and virtues are of a strange nature, for the more we have, the fewer we think we have.

Virtue steals, like a guilty thing, into the secret haunts of vice and infamy, clings to their devoted victim, and will not be driven quite away. Nothing can destroy the human heart.

It is as hard to satirize well a man of distinguished vices, as to praise well a man of distinguished virtues.

When our vices desert us, we flatter ourselves that we are deserting our vices.

Pleasure itself is not a vice