Famous Quotes at Understand Famous Quotes dot com

We should often be ashamed of our finest actions if the world understood our motives.
~~ Francois de La Rochefoucauld ~~ (1613 - 1680)

Though it may seem cynical, in my view, it’s quite true. Very few people in this world commit themselves to do good things for others without any selfish motive. Most people have some ulterior motives, sometimes the motives are extremely sinister and even criminal motives. For example, the cases of some priests abusing boys under their care. Priests, by their very profession, are supposed to be God fearing and caring of other humans. That did not prevent some of them from indulging in such criminal activity. And there have many other cases such as volunteer coaches etc. indulging in similar sinister activities.

Sometimes the motive may be just the expectation of getting some fame or publicity or both. Though it’s still a selfish motive, I have no problem if somebody does good deeds just to gain some fame and publicity.

I think that it will be prudent for the world not only to scrutinize the evil deeds but also sometimes to scrutinize the motives behind the so called good deeds. It’s no secret that what humans think, what they say and what they do, is often worlds apart.

Browse all Francois de La Rochefoucauld quotes