Molière Quotes

Les gens de qualité savent tout sans avoir jamais rien appris..

Cl. In short, we ought to be blind throughout this play, and pretend not to see anything in it. Ur. We ought not to see what is not there.

MADAME PERNELLE. My dear, appearances are oft deceiving, And seeing shouldn't always be believing.

Ch. What does it matter that she fails in the laws of Vaugelas, provided she does not fail in the cooking? I would rather, I would, that in cleaning the vegetables she should make the verbs agree ill with the nouns, and say a hundred times a low or bad word, than that she should burn y my meat or put too much salt in my soup; I live on good soup, and not on fine language.

A lover pays his court where his heart has taken root; he aims at gaining every one’s favour in that spot; and so as to have no one opposed to his flame, he endeavours to please the very house-dog.

Esa frialdad cruel con que los hombres pagan la
mayoría de las veces las manifestaciones demasiado ardientes de un amor puro.

On peut être honnête homme et faire mal des vers.

You may plainly perceive the traitor through his mask; he is well known every-where in his true colors; his rolling eyes and his honeyed tones impose only on those who do not know him. People are aware that this low-bred fellow, who deserves to be pilloried, has, by the dirtiest jobs, made his way in the world; and that the splendid position he has acquired makes merit repine and virtue blush. Yet whatever dishonourable epithets may be launched against him everywhere, nobody defends his wretched honour. Call him a rogue, an infamous wretch, a confounded scoundrel if you like, all the world will say “yea, ” and no one contradicts you. But for all that, his bowing and scraping are welcome everywhere; he is received, smiled upon, and wriggles himself into all kinds of society; and, if any appointment is to be secured by intriguing, he will carry the day over a man of the greatest worth. Zounds! these are mortal stabs to me, to see vice parleyed with; and sometimes times I feel suddenly inclined to fly into a wilderness far from the approach of men.

Mon Dieu, que vous êtes vulgaire ! Pour moi, un de mes étonnements, c'est que vous ayez pu faire une fille si spirituelle que moi.

All that is not prose is verse; and all that is not verse is prose.

I might, by chance, write something just as shoddy;
But then I wouldn't show it to everybody.

DORINE. Then what's your plan about this other match? MARIANE. To kill myself, if it is forced upon me. DORINE. Good! That's a remedy I hadn't thought of. Just die, and everything will be all right. This medicine is marvellous, indeed! It drives me mad to hear folk talk such nonsense. MARIANE. Oh dear, Dorine you get in such a temper! You have no sympathy for people's troubles. DORINE. I have no sympathy when folk talk nonsense, And flatten out as you do, at a pinch.

Mais, supposé, comme il est vrai, que les exercices de la piété souffrent des intervelles et que les hommes aient besoin de divertissement, je soutiens qu'on ne leur en peut trouver un qui soit plus innocent que la comédie.

The more we love someone, the less we flatter them; it is by excusing nothing that true love shows itself.

Et voudrois-tu que je fusse insensible aux tendres protestations de cette passion ardente qu'il témoigne pour moi ?