François de La Rochefoucauld
1613-1680 · French · Moral Philosophy, Moral Psychology, Ethics, the Moralist Tradition
Our virtues are most frequently but vices disguised.
François de La Rochefoucauld was a duke of the highest rank who spent his early life in intrigue and rebellion, conspiring against Richelieu and then Mazarin and fighting on the losing side of the Fronde, where he was gravely wounded and nearly blinded. Defeated in politics and disabused of the illusions of ambition, he withdrew into the salons and turned the observation he had spent on courts and armies upon the human heart.
Topics François de La Rochefoucauld addresses
- amour-propre (self-love)
- self-interest as the hidden motive
- the maxim as a form of thought
- virtues as disguised vices
- the unmasking of moral pretension
- moral psychology
- the disabused view of human nature
- hypocrisy and self-deception
- the rarity of disinterested virtue
- friendship and its self-interest
- love and vanity
- pity as concealed self-regard
- generosity and the desire to be praised
- courage and the fear of shame
- humility and pride
- the passions and their disguises
- reason as the dupe of the passions
- fortune and chance in human affairs
- humeur (temperament) and the body
- the government of conduct by mood
- constancy and inconstancy
- the desire to appear rather than to be
- self-knowledge and its limits
- the social comedy of esteem
Questions to put to François de La Rochefoucauld
Amour-Propre and the Anatomy of Self-Love
- What do you mean by amour-propre?
- How does self-love hide itself from us?
- Is every virtue really just a disguise for self-interest?
- Can we ever truly know our own motives?
- Why do you say self-love is the greatest of all flatterers?
The Disguises of Virtue
- How is generosity often just a desire to be praised?
- What makes courage different from the fear of looking cowardly?
- Why do you think pity is really about ourselves?
- How can humility be a form of pride?
- What's the difference between wanting to be virtuous and wanting to appear virtuous?
Friendship, Love, and the Commerce of Interests
- Is friendship just a mutual exchange of advantages?
- How is love a form of self-love?
- Do you think disinterested friendship is even possible?
- Why do we have strength enough to bear the misfortunes of others?
- What makes true confidence between friends so rare?
Fortune, Humour, and the Limits of the Will
- How much of our virtue is really just good luck?
- What role does bodily temperament play in our conduct?
- Why do you say reason is the dupe of the passions?
- Is constancy real or just a story we tell about ourselves?
- How do moods and circumstances govern us more than our will?
The Maxim and the Art of Unmasking
- Why did you choose the maxim as your form of writing?
- What's at stake for you in unmasking moral pretension?
- Are the Maxims meant to make us despair or to clarify?
- How did your experience in the Fronde shape your view of human nature?
- What do you mean when you say hypocrisy is the homage vice pays to virtue?
Converse with François de La Rochefoucauld on Simposeum. Replies are grounded in François de La Rochefoucauld's own writing, cited to the page.