We are revealed to others in times of crisis, and even more so to ourselves.

[Les occasions nous font connoître aux autres, et encore plus à nous-mêmes.]

François VI, duc de La Rochefoucauld (1613–1680) French epigrammatist, memoirist, noble
Réflexions ou sentences et maximes morales [Reflections; or Sentences and Moral Maxims], ¶345 (1665–1678) [tr. FitzGibbon (1957)]
    (Source)

First present in the 4th (1675) edition.

(Source (French)). Other translations:

Opportunities make us known to ourselves and others.
[pub. Donaldson (1783), ¶323; ed. Lepoittevin-Lacroix (1797), ¶315]

Opportunities make us known to ourselves as well as to others.
[ed. Carvill (1835), ¶285]

Opportunities make us known to others, and still more to ourselves.
[ed. Gowens (1851), ¶355]

Opportunity makes us known to others, but more to ourselves.
[tr. Bund/Friswell (1871), ¶345]

Circumstances make us known to others, and still more to ourselves.
[tr. Heard (1917), ¶352]

Crises reveal our characters to others, and still more to ourselves.
[tr. Stevens (1939), ¶345]

Situations reveal the truth about us to others, and even more to ourselves.
[tr. Kronenberger (1959), ¶345]

Circumstances reveal us to others and still more to ourselves.
[tr. Tancock (1959), ¶345]

Opportunities make us known to others, and still more to ourselves.
[tr. Whichello (2016), ¶345]

Circumstances enable us to know others, and even more to know ourselves.
[tr. Chandler, ¶345]


 
Added on 30-Mar-09 | Last updated 17-Oct-26
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