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Find Favour with Men of Sense. The tepid Yes of a remarkable man is worth more than all the applause of the vulgar: you cannot make a meal off the smoke of chaff. The wise speak with understanding and their praise gives permanent satisfaction. The sage Antigonus reduced the theatre of his fame to Zeus alone, and Plato called Aristotle his whole school. Some strive to fill their stomach albeit only with the breath of the mob. Even monarchs have need of authors, and fear their pens more than ugly women the painter's pencil.

Find Favour with Men of Sense. The tepid Yes of a remarkable man is worth more than all the applause of the vulgar: you cannot make a meal off the smoke of chaff. The wise speak with understanding and their praise gives permanent satisfaction. The sage Antigonus reduced the theatre of his fame to Zeus alone, and Plato called Aristotle his whole school. Some strive to fill their stomach albeit only with the breath of the mob. Even monarchs have need of authors, and fear their pens more than ugly women the painter's pencil.

Approximate author period: c. 1630 AD · renaissance

Meaning not yet available

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Attribution & collection notes
Author or tradition
Baltasar Gracián
Attribution: attributed
Country attributed
Not established
A country attribution does not establish the earliest origin.
Historical period
Approximate author period: c. 1630 AD · renaissance
author lifetime midpoint (1601–1658); not quotation composition date
An author lifetime, approximate period or collection date is not necessarily the date when these words were first written or spoken.
Recorded source
The Art of Worldly Wisdom (1892 English translation) (1892 AD)

Main maxims, complete printed maxim cclxxxi; Joseph Jacobs translation; London: Macmillan and Co., Limited,1892 (source title page supplies bracketed year)

A collection's publication date can be later than the words it records.