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vanity quotes

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“the shameless vanity of utter fools can so strongly determine the fate of others.” Philip Roth, The Plot Against America
“It is very often nothing but our own vanity that deceives us.” Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice
“Vanity and pride are different things, though the words are often used synonymously. A person may be proud without being vain. Pride relates more to our opinion of ourselves, vanity to what we would have others think of us.” Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice
“Yes, vanity is a weakness indeed. But pride—where there is a real superiority of mind, pride will be always under good regulation.” Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice
“The fool doth think he is wise, but the wise man knows himself to be a fool.” William Shakespeare, As You Like It
“Vanity working on a weak head, produces every sort of mischief.” Jane Austen, Emma
“Besides, nothing makes one so vain as being told that one is a sinner. Conscience makes egotists of us all.” Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray
“The vanity of others is only counter to our taste when it is counter to our vanity.” Friedrich Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil
“if you spend your life sparing people's feelings and feeding their vanity, you get so you can't distinguish what should be respected in them.” F. Scott Fitzgerald, Tender Is the Night
“Vanity Fair is a very vain, wicked, foolish place, full of all sorts of humbugs and falsenesses and pretensions.” William Makepeace Thackeray, Vanity Fair
“The charm of fame is so great, that we like every object to which it is attached, even death.” Blaise Pascal, Pensées
“No wonder that God in His special grace subjects the ministers of the Gospel to all kinds of afflictions, otherwise they could not cope with this ugly beast called vainglory.” Martin Luther, Commentary on the Epistle to the Galatians
“I have had my share of vanity; for as a young man I was admired by women; and as a statue I am praised by art critics.” George Bernard Shaw, Man and Superman
“Gracious Providence, to whom I owe all my powers, why didst thou not withhold some of those blessings I possess, and substitute in their place a feeling of self-confidence and contentment?” Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, The Sorrows of Young Werther
“The true knight of faith is a witness, never a teacher, and therein lies his deep humanity, which is worth a good deal more than this silly participation in others' weal and woe which is honored by the name of sympathy, whereas in fact it is...” Søren Kierkegaard, Fear and Trembling
“Had I been in love, I could not have been more wretchedly blind! But vanity, not love, has been my folly.” Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice
“Then I feel, Harry, that I have given away my whole soul to some one who treats it as if it were a flower to put in his coat, a bit of decoration to charm his vanity, an ornament for a summer's day.” Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray
“Gazing up into the darkness I saw myself as a creature driven and derided by vanity; and my eyes burned with anguish and anger.” James Joyce, Dubliners
“There is, peradventure, no more manifest vanity than to write of it so vainly.” Michel de Montaigne, The Essays of Michel de Montaigne
“Vanity is becoming a nuisance; I can see why women give it up, eventually. But I’m not ready for that yet.” Margaret Atwood, Cat's Eye
“Doubtless this persistence was the best course for his own dignity: but pride only helps us to be generous; it never makes us so, any more than vanity makes us witty.” George Eliot, Middlemarch
“I had not, I said to myself, come into the future to carry on a miniature flirtation.” H. G. Wells, The Time Machine
“And he was vain: I do not believe I have ever met a more physically attractive person who was more acutely aware of his own physical attractiveness.” John Green, The Fault in Our Stars
“Provided a man is not mad, he can be cured of any folly but vanity; there is no cure for this but experience, if indeed there is any cure for it at all” Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Emile, or On Education
“The consciousness of the falsity of present pleasures, and the ignorance of the vanity of absent pleasures, cause inconstancy.” Blaise Pascal, Pensées

Related topics

pride foolishness ego weakness writing stupidity humility love narcissism wisdom contentment death women God power experience respect youth sin hypocrisy

Related authors

Jane Austen (5)
Oscar Wilde (2)
Blaise Pascal (2)
William Shakespeare (1)
F. Scott Fitzgerald (1)
Friedrich Nietzsche (1)
John Green (1)
Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1)
George Bernard Shaw (1)
James Joyce (1)
George Eliot (1)
Michel de Montaigne (1)
Margaret Atwood (1)
William Makepeace Thackeray (1)
Martin Luther (1)
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1)
H. G. Wells (1)
Søren Kierkegaard (1)
Philip Roth (1)

Related sources

Fear and Trembling (1)
Tender Is the Night (1)
Pride and Prejudice (4)
The Picture of Dorian Gray (2)
Pensées (2)
Emma (1)
As You Like It (1)
The Fault in Our Stars (1)
Man and Superman (1)
The Essays of Michel de Montaigne (1)
The Sorrows of Young Werther (1)
Vanity Fair (1)
Beyond Good and Evil (1)
Middlemarch (1)
Commentary on the Epistle to the Galatians (1)
The Time Machine (1)
Emile, or On Education (1)
Dubliners (1)
The Plot Against America (1)
Cat's Eye (1)