41 Never exaggerate. It isn’t wise to use superlatives. They offend the truth and cast doubt on your judgment. By exaggerating, you squander your praise and reveal a lack of knowledge and taste. Praise awakens curiosity, which begets desire, and later, when the goods seem overpriced, as often happens, expectation feels cheated and avenges itself by running down the praised and the praiser. The prudent show restraint, and would rather fall short than long. True eminences are rare, so temper your esteem. To overvalue something is a form of lying. It can ruin your reputation for good taste, and — even worse — for wisdom.
Aragonese Jesuit and baroque prose writer and philosopher in Castilian language (1601-1658)
Baltasar Gracián y Morales (8 January 1601 – 6 December 1658), most widely known as Baltasar Gracián, was a Spanish Jesuit author regarded as one of the most accomplished prose stylists of the Baroque era.
From: Wikiquote (CC BY-SA 4.0)
Pen Names:
Lorenzo Gracián
Alternative Names:
Balthasar Gracian
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Baltasar Gracian
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Baltasar Gracián y Morales
From Wikidata (CC0)
Life is arduous without any breaks, like a long journey without any inns. Learned variety makes it pleasant. Spend the first part of a fine life in communication with the dead. We are born to know and to know ourselves, and books reliably turn us into people. Spend the second part with the living: see and examine all that's good in the world. Not everything can be found in one country; the universal Father has shared out his gifts and sometimes endows the ugliest with the most. Let the third stage be spent entirely with yourself: the ultimate happiness, to philosophize.
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