Francois de la Rochefoucauld

TL;DR

François de La Rochefoucauld (1613–1680) was a French aristocrat, cavalryman, schemer, and writer who lived a swashbuckling life of intrigue, kidnapping the queen, leading rebellions, and surviving being shot in the face, which informed his later philosophy.

Key insights

• Rochefoucauld’s aristocratic background and active life (fighting, seducing, plotting) gave him unique credibility to see through philosophers who, he claimed, merely justify their own weaknesses by c
• His philosophy systematically strips away pretense: most “friendship” is expectation of future benefit, most “love” is social convention, most “virtue” is disguised vice — but this cynicism serves to
• Strengths and weaknesses are two sides of the same coin; eliminating a vice may destroy the corresponding virtue (e.g., Napoleon’s Murat: one such man is essential, two is chaos).