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A clever man ought to so regulate his interests that each will fall in due order. Our greediness so often troubles us, making us run after so many things at the same time, that while we too eagerly look after the least we miss the greatest.

A clever man ought to so regulate his interests that each will fall in due order. Our greediness so often troubles us, making us run after so many things at the same time, that while we too eagerly look after the least we miss the greatest.

Approximate author period: c. 1646 AD · renaissance

Meaning not yet available

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Attribution & collection notes
Author or tradition
Francis, Duc De La Rochefoucauld
Attribution: attributed
Country attributed
Not established
A country attribution does not establish the earliest origin.
Historical period
Approximate author period: c. 1646 AD · renaissance
author lifetime midpoint (1613–1680); 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
Reflections; or Sentences and Moral Maxims (1871 English edition) (1871 AD)

Main maxims, complete printed maxim 66; J. W. Willis Bund and J. Hain Friswell translation; Simpson Low, Son, and Marston,188FleetStreet,1871 (printed imprint spelling retained)

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