Pierre Beaumarchais

If censorship reigns, there cannot be sincere flattery, and only small men are afraid of small writings.

Pierre-Augustin Caron de Beaumarchais (24 January 1732 – 18 May 1799) was a French playwright, arms dealer, inventor, and social satirist.

Quotes

Le Barbier de Séville (1773)

• Que les gens d'esprit sont bêtes.
  • What silly people wits are!
  • Act I, sc. i. Hoyt's (1922) p. 883
  • Other translations:
    • What brutes wits are!
      • Ramage (1866) p. 2

• Aujourd'hui, ce qui ne vaut pas la peine d'être dit, on le chante.
  • Nowadays, whatever is not worth saying is sung.
  • Act I, sc. ii (Figaro). Harbottle and Dalbiac (1904) p. 10
  • Other translations:
    • That which is not worth speaking they sing.
      • Hoyt's (1922) p. 712

• Je me presse de rire de tout, de peur d'être obligé d'en pleurer.
  • I hasten to laugh at everything, for fear of being obliged to weep.
  • Act I, sc. ii (Figaro). Harbottle and Dalbiac (1904) p. 63
  • Other translations:
    • I quickly laugh at everything, for fear of having to cry.
      • Bartlett's, 13th ed. (1955) p. 367
    • I force myself to laugh at everything, for fear of having to weep.
      • Kronenberger (1946) p. xi

• Médiocre et rampant, et l'on arrive à tout.
  • Be commonplace and creeping, and you attain all things.
  • Act III, sc. vii. Hoyt's (1922) p. 759
  • Other translations:
    • Be commonplace and creeping, and everything is within your reach.
      • Ramage (1866) p. 3

• Calomniez, calomniez; il en reste toujours quelque chose.
  • Calumniate, calumniate; there will always be something which sticks.
  • Act III, sc. xiii. Cassell's (1907) p. 713
  • This is the Latin proverb:—"Audacter calumniare; semper aliquid hæret." See: Bacon, De Dignitate et Augmentis Scientiarum, viii, 2
  • Other translations:
    • Caluminate enough, something always sticks.
      • Ramage (1866) p. 3

• Il n'est pas nécessaire de tenir les choses pour en raisonner.
  • It is not necessary to retain facts that we may reason concerning them.
  • Act V, sc. iv. Hoyt's (1922) p. 658
  • Other translations:
    • It is by no means necessary to understand things to speak confidently about them.
      • Ramage (1866) p. 3

• Il fallait un calculateur, ce fut un danseur qui l'obtint.
  • An accountant was the person wanted, but a dancer got the place.
  • Act V, sc. iv. Ramage (1866) p. 3

The Marriage of Figaro (1778)

• De toutes les choses sérieuses, le mariage étant la plus bouffonne.
  • Of all serious things, marriage is the most ludicrous.
  • Act I, sc. ix. De Finod (1881) p. 24

• Boire sans soif et faire l'amour en tout temps, madame, il n'y a que ça qui nous distingue des autres bêtes.
  • To drink without thirst, to make love without cessation: this is what distinguishes us from the lower animals.
  • Act II, sc. xxi. De Finod (1881) p. 118
  • Other translations:
    • That which distinguishes man from the beast is drinking without being thirsty, and making love at all seasons.
      • Westermarck (1891) p. 24
    • Drinking when not thirsty and making love all the time, madam, is all that distinguishes us from other animals.
      • Unsourced

• Parce que vous êtes un grand seigneur, vous vous croyez un grand génie! ... vous vous êtes donné la peine de naître, et rien de plus. Du reste homme assez ordinaire!
  • Because you are a great lord, you believe yourself a great genius! ... You have been at the trouble of being born, and nothing more: an ordinary man enough.
  • Act II, sc. ii. Quarterly Review (July 1873) p. 123
  • Other translations:
    • You have taken the trouble to be born, no more! Otherwise, an ordinary man!
      • Dickinson (1892) p. 6
    • Because you are a great lord, you believe that you are a great genius! You took the trouble to be born, no more. You remain an ordinary enough man!
      • Unsourced

• Sans la liberté de blâmer, il n'est point d'éloge flatteur; et qu'il n'y a que les petits hommes qui redoutent les petits écrits.
  • Without freedom to blame, no praise is flattering, and none but little men are afraid of little writings.
  • Act V, sc. iii. Lowell (1892) p. 327
    • If censorship reigns, there cannot be sincere flattery, and none but little men are afraid of little writings.
      • Unsourced

• Tout finit par des chansons.
  • Everything ends with songs.
  • End. Hoyt's (1922) p. 732

Attributed

• In love, too much of it is not enough.
  • De Finod (1881) p. 83

• Nature has said to woman: Be fair if thou canst, be virtuous if thou wilt; but, considerate, thou must be.
  • De Finod (1881) p. 89

Sources

• Craufurd Tait Ramage, Beautiful Thoughts from French and Italian Authors (Liverpool: Edward Howell, 1866) pp. 2–3

• "Beaumarchais and his Times" [Review of Beaumarchais et son Temps: Etudes sur la Société en France au XVIII Siècle, d'après des Documents Inédits by Louis de Loménie] in The London Quarterly Review, no. 269 (July 1873) art. 8, p. 123

• J. De Finod, A Thousand Flashes of French Wit, Wisdom, and Wickedness (New York: D Appleton and Co, 1881) pp. 24, 83, 89, 118

• Edward Westermarck, The History of Human Marriage (London: Macmillan and Co, 1891) ch. 1, p. 24

• G. Lowes Dickinson, Revolution and Reaction in Modern France (London: George Allen, 1892) p. 6

• Edward J. Lowell, The Eve of the French Revolution (Houghton Mifflin Co, 1892) p. 327

• Thomas Benfield Harbottle and Philip Hugh Dalbiac, Dictionary of Quotations: French and Italian, 2nd ed. (1904) pp. 10, 13, 63, 101, 118, 143, 149, 235

• W. Francis H. King, Classical and Foreign Quotations, 3rd ed. (1904) nos. 241, 278, 1014, 1032, 1180, 1321, 1505, 1538, 2532, 3000

• W. Gurney Benham, Cassell's Book of Quotations: Proverbs and Household Words (1907)

• Kate Louise Roberts, Hoyt's New Cyclopedia of Practical Quotations (1922)

• Louis Kronenberger, The Pleasure of Their Company (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1946) introduction, p. xi

• Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 13th ed. (1955) p. 367

• A. Norman Jeffares and Martin Gray, Collins Dictionary of Quotations (HarperCollins, 1995); repr. A Dictionary of Quotations (New York: Barnes & Noble, 1997) p. 49