La Rochefoucauld §laroch_218: Hypocrisy is the homage vice pays to virtue.

Hypocrisy is the homage vice pays to virtue. [So Massillon, in one of his sermons, "Vice pays homage to virtue in doing honour to her appearance." So Junius, writing to the Duke of Grafton, says, "You have done as much mischief to the community as Machiavel, if Machiavel had not known that an appearance of morals and religion are useful in society."--28 Sept. 1771.]