Ninon De L'Enclos Quotes

#1. Feminine virtue is nothing but a convenient masculine invention.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#2. Inconstancy is the child of satiety.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#3. There are no perfect women in the world; only hypocrites exhibit no defects.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#4. If God had to give a woman wrinkles, He might at least have put them on the soles of her feet.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#5. A woman is more influenced by what she divines than by what she is told.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#6. Ennui, the parent of expensive and ruinous vices.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#7. The more sins you confess, the more books you will sell.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#8. What is death, after all? We leave only mortals behind us.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#9. The joy of the mind is the measure of its strength.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#10. Old age is women's hell.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#11. The less heart, the more comfort.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#12. Men lose more conquests by their own awkwardness than by any virtue in the woman.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#13. That which is striking and beautiful is not always good, but that which is good is always beautiful.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#14. Glances are the first billets-doux of love.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#15. Who has not raised a tombstone, here and there, over buried hopes and dead joys, on the road of life? Like the scars of the heart, they are not to be obliterated.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#16. Memory is ever active, ever true. Alas, if it were only as easy to forget!

Ninon De L'Enclos

#17. A man is given the choice between loving women and understanding them.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#18. The passions do not die out; they burn out.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#19. One must choose between loving women and knowing them.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#20. Wit is a dangerous talent in friendship.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#21. Gentleness! more powerful than Hercules.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#22. Gossip, like ennui, is born of idleness.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#23. A cunning woman is her own mistress because she confides in no one. She who deceives others anticipates deceit, and guards herself.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#24. It requires infinitely a greater genius to make love, than to make war.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#25. After the age of eighty, all contemporaries are friends.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#26. Indiscretion and wickedness, be it known, are first cousins.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#27. The joy of a spirit is the measure of its power.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#28. The secret known to two is no longer a secret.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#29. Today a new sun rises for me; everything lives, everything is animated, everything seems to speak to me of my passion, everything invites me to cherish it.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#30. We should lay in a store of food, but never of pleasures; these should be gathered day by day.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#31. Hatred is nearly always honest
rarely, if ever, assumed. So much cannot be said for love.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#32. Never tell a loved one of an infidelity: you would be badly rewarded for your troubles. Although one dislikes being deceived, one likes even less to be undeceived.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#33. It takes a hundred times more skill to make love than to command an army.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#34. I hold those wise who know how to be happy.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#35. Equality is the share of every one at their advent upon earth, and equality is also theirs when placed beneath it.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#36. Novelty is the storehouse of pleasure.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#37. Oaths are the counterfeit money with which we pay the sacrifice of love.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#38. The loss of friends is a tax on age!

Ninon De L'Enclos

#39. Old age is a woman's hell.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#40. Love never dies of starvation, but often of indigestion.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#41. If a man needs a religion to conduct himself properly in this world, it is a sign that he has either a limited mind or a corrupt heart.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#42. Love without desire is a delusion: it does not exist in nature.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#43. I have always sworn to my lovers to love them eternally, but for me eternity is a quarter of an hour.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#44. There are other things besides beauty with which to captivate the hearts of men. The Italians have a saying: Fair is not fair, but that which pleaseth.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#45. A sensible woman should be guided by her head when taking a husband, and by her heart when taking a lover.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#46. There is always a moment in the pyramid of our lives when the apex is reached.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#47. It is strange that modesty is the rule for women when what they most value in men is boldness.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#48. Reserve delicacy of sentiment for friendship; accept love for what it is.... The more dignity you give it, the more dangerous you make it.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#49. Friendship should be in the singular; it can be no more plural than love.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#50. When our desires are fulfilled, we never fail to realize the wealth of imagination and the paucity of reality.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#51. There is a certain time of life, when we value a good stomach more than the mind ...

Ninon De L'Enclos

#52. Shall I tell you what makes love so dangerous? 'Tis the too high idea we are apt to form of it.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#53. Actors ought to be larger than life. You come across quite enough ordinary, nondescript people in daily life and I don't see why you should be subjected to them on the stage too.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#54. Words really flattering are not those which we prepare but those which escape us unthinkingly.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#55. It is not enough to be wise, one must be engaging.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#56. Firmness is great; persistency is greater.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#57. Soft moonlight and tender love harmonize together wonderfully.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#58. The mind has great advantages over the body; however the body often furnishes little treats ... which offer the mind relief from sad thoughts.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#59. A woman should not take a lover without the consent of her heart, nor a husband without the consent of her reason.

Ninon De L'Enclos

#60. The resistance of a woman is not always a proof of her virtue, but more frequently of her experience.

Ninon De L'Enclos