“Courtesy is only a thin veneer on the general selfishness.”
La politesse cache très-imparfaitement l’égoïsme général.
Part I, ch. VII.
Letters of Two Brides (1841-1842)
Original
La politesse cache très-imparfaitement l’égoïsme général.
Letters of Two Brides (1841-1842)
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Honoré de Balzac 157
French writer 1799–1850Related quotes
Leonard Read Journals, November 11, 1951 https://history.fee.org/leonard-read-journal/1951/leonard-e-read-journal-november-1951/
Frédéric, L. (1984). Daily life in Japan at the time of the samurai, 1185-1603. Tokyo: Tuttle.

Source: On Representative Government (1861), Ch. II: The Criterion of a Good Form of Government (p. 167)

Letter to his daughter Frances Scott Fitzgerald (July 1938)
Quoted, Letters

“I only appear selfish to a saint.”
Ron English's Fauxlosophy: Volume 2 (2022)