Action, looks, words, steps, form the alphabet by which you may spell character.
– Johann Kaspar Lavater
Conscience is the sentinel of virtue.
– Johann Kaspar Lavater
Don't speak evil of someone if you don't know for certain, and if you do know ask yourself, why am I telling it?
– Johann Kaspar Lavater
Have you ever seen a pedant with a warm heart?
– Johann Kaspar Lavater
He submits to be seen through a microscope, who suffers himself to be caught in a fit of passion.
– Johann Kaspar Lavater
He who has no taste for order, will be often wrong in his judgment, and seldom considerate or conscientious in his actions.
– Johann Kaspar Lavater
He who seldom speaks, and with one calm well-timed word can strike dumb the loquacious, is a genius or a hero.
– Johann Kaspar Lavater
Him, who incessantly laughs in the street, you may commonly hear grumbling in his closet.
– Johann Kaspar Lavater
I am prejudiced in favor of him who, without impudence, can ask boldly. He has faith in humanity, and faith in himself. No one who is not accustomed to giving grandly can ask nobly and with boldness.
– Johann Kaspar Lavater
If you wish to appear agreeable in society, you must consent to be taught many things which you know already.
– Johann Kaspar Lavater
Intuition is the clear conception of the whole at once.
– Johann Kaspar Lavater
Mistrust the person who finds everything good, and the person who finds everything evil, and mistrust even more the person who is indifferent to everything.
– Johann Kaspar Lavater
The craftiest trickery are too short and ragged a cloak to cover a bad heart.
– Johann Kaspar Lavater
The great rule of moral conduct is next to God, respect time.
– Johann Kaspar Lavater
The jealous are possessed by a mad devil and a dull spirit at the same time.
– Johann Kaspar Lavater
The prudent see only the difficulties, the bold only the advantages, of a great enterprise; the hero sees both; diminishes the former and makes the latter preponderate, and so conquers.
– Johann Kaspar Lavater
There are three classes of men; the retrograde, the stationary and the progressive.
– Johann Kaspar Lavater
Trust him not with your secrets, who, when left alone in your room, turns over your papers.
– Johann Kaspar Lavater
Who makes quick use of the moment is a genius of prudence.
– Johann Kaspar Lavater
You are not very good if you are not better than your best friends imagine you to be.
– Johann Kaspar Lavater
You may tell a man thou art a fiend, but not your nose wants blowing; to him alone who can bear a thing of that kind, you may tell all.
– Johann Kaspar Lavater
Never tell evil of a man, if you do not know it for certainty, and if you know it for a certainty, then ask yourself, 'Why should I tell it?'
– Johann Kaspar Lavater
Neatness begets order but from order to taste there is the same difference as from taste to genius, or from love to friendship.