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La Rochefoucauld 054: The contempt of riches in philosophers was only a hidden desire to avenge the...
larochefoucauld maxims
The contempt of riches in philosophers was only a hidden desire to avenge their merit upon the injustice of fortune, by despising the very goods of which fortune had deprived them; it was a secret to guard themselves against the degradation of poverty, it was a back way by which to arrive at that distinction which they could not gain by riches. ["It is always easy as well as agreeable for the inferior ranks of mankind to claim merit from the contempt of that pomp and pleasure which fortune has placed beyond their reach. The virtue of the primitive Christians, like that of the first Romans, was very frequently guarded by poverty and ignorance."--Gibbon, Decline And Fall, Chap. 15.]
- cites → Romans
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