Life & Wisdom Quote by Andre Maurois

A neat little trap is hidden in Maurois's dash. He sets up "modesty and unselfishness" like polished medals, then swivels: these are the virtues men praise - and pass by. The line doesn't just complain about hypocrisy; it anatomizes a social reflex. We applaud traits that make other people easier to live with, then we reward the opposite because ambition, display, and self-interest produce visible outcomes. Modesty doesn't market itself. Unselfishness doesn't lobby.

Maurois is writing in a world where "virtue" often functions as etiquette: a vocabulary for approving what we want others to do. Praising humility can be a way of keeping rivals small; celebrating selflessness can be a way of outsourcing labor and emotional care. The subtext is slightly cruel: the praise is real, but it's cheap. It costs nothing to compliment someone for not taking up space, and it costs even less to walk right past them when promotions, attention, or protection are being handed out.

The sentence works because it mimics the very gesture it's condemning. The first half offers a warm, respectable list; the second half, delivered with that clipped, almost conversational aside, performs the dismissal. It's a writerly sleight of hand that feels like overhearing the truth behind polite applause. In that sense, it's less moral instruction than social reportage: a reminder that public admiration and private incentives are rarely aligned, and that the virtues most praised are often the ones least paid.