Anne Sophie Swetchine (1782–1857,) née Soymonoff or Soymanova, was a Russian mystic, writer, and salonnière.
Born in Moscow, Swetchine was the daughter of one of the Empress Catherine the Great’s closest advisors. Swetchine was educated well, spoke many European languages, and became the lady-in-waiting to Empress Maria Fedorovna.
In 1799, Swetchine married General Nicholas Sergeyevich Swetchine, but the couple could not have children. She turned to religion for comfort, came under the influence of the Savoyard philosopher Joseph de Maistre, and converted to Roman Catholicism in 1815. Settling in Paris, Swetchine fostered her religious leanings by maintaining a private chapel. She opened a salon in Paris that became famous for not only its spiritual atmosphere but also its courtesy and intellect.
Swetchine’s Life and Works (2 vols., 1860,) celebrated for its mysticism, was published posthumously by French politician and author Frédéric Alfred Pierre, comte de Falloux. They were followed by her Letters (2 vols., 1861.)
More: Wikipedia • READ: Works by Sophie Swetchine
We are often prophets to others, only because we are our own historians.
—Sophie Swetchine
Topics: Experience
Our vanity is the constant enemy of our dignity.
—Sophie Swetchine
It is the enemy who keeps the sentinel watchful.
—Sophie Swetchine
The world has no sympathy with any but positive griefs; it will pity you for what you lose, but never for what you lack.
—Sophie Swetchine
Topics: Sympathy
In this world of change naught which comes stays and naught which goes is lost.
—Sophie Swetchine
Topics: Change
We do not judge men by what they are in themselves, but by what they are relatively to us.
—Sophie Swetchine
Topics: Judgment
Strength alone knows conflict; weakness is below even defeat, and is born vanquished.
—Sophie Swetchine
Topics: Strength
There is, by God’s grace, an immeasurable distance between late and too late.
—Sophie Swetchine
Topics: Procrastination
If we look closely at this world, where God seems so utterly forgotten, we shall find that it is he, who, after all, commands the most fidelity and the most love.
—Sophie Swetchine
Topics: God
Those who make us happy are always thankful to us for being so; their gratitude is the reward of their benefits.
—Sophie Swetchine
Topics: Gratitude
I study much, and the more I study the oftener I go back to those first principles which are so simple that childhood itself can lisp them.
—Sophie Swetchine
If it were ever allowable to forget what is due to superiority of rank, it would be when the privileged themselves remembered it.
—Sophie Swetchine
What I most value next to eternity, is time.
—Sophie Swetchine
Topics: Time
By becoming more unhappy, we sometimes learn how to be less so.
—Sophie Swetchine
Topics: Unhappiness, Happiness, Difficulties, Adversity
When two truths seem directly opposed to each other, we must not question either, but remember there is a third — God — who reserves to himself the right to harmonize them.
—Sophie Swetchine
Topics: Truth
Years do not make sages; they only make old men.
—Sophie Swetchine
Topics: Age
Prayer, says St. Jerome, “is a groan.” Ah! our groans are prayers as well. The very cry of distress is an involuntary appeal to that invisible Power whose aid the soul invokes.
—Sophie Swetchine
Topics: Prayer
The best of lessons, for a good many people, would be, to listen at a key hole. — It is a pity for such that the practice is dishonorable.
—Sophie Swetchine
In the opinion of the world marriage ends all, as it does in a comedy. — The truth is precisely the reverse; it begins all.
—Sophie Swetchine
Topics: Marriage
To love deeply in one direction makes us more loving in all others.
—Sophie Swetchine
Topics: Love
Youth should be a savings bank.
—Sophie Swetchine
Topics: Youth
Kindness causes us to learn, and to forget, many things.
—Sophie Swetchine
Topics: Compassion, Service, Kindness
Pride dries the tears of anger and vexation; humility, those of grief. The one is indignant that we should suffer: the other calms us by the reminder that we deserve nothing else.
—Sophie Swetchine
The only true method of action in this world is to be in it, but not of it.
—Sophie Swetchine
Topics: World
The heart has always the pardoning power.
—Sophie Swetchine
Topics: Forgiveness
There are not good things enough in life, to indemnify us for the neglect of a single duty.
—Sophie Swetchine
Topics: Duty
In order to have an enemy, one must be somebody. — One must be a force before he can be resisted by another force — a malicious enemy is better than a clumsy friend.
—Sophie Swetchine
Topics: Enemies
Resignation is putting God between ourselves and our troubles.
—Sophie Swetchine
Repentance is accepted remorse.
—Sophie Swetchine
Topics: Forgiveness
The best advice on the art of being happy is about as easy to follow as advice to be well when one is sick.
—Sophie Swetchine
Topics: Happiness
The chains which cramp us most are those which weigh on us least.
—Sophie Swetchine
Those who have suffered much are like those who know many languages; they have learned to understand and be understood by all.
—Sophie Swetchine
Topics: Adversity
To have ideas is to gather flowers; to think, is to weave them into garlands.
—Sophie Swetchine
Topics: Ideas
Might we not say to the confused voices which sometimes arise from the depths of our being: “Ladies, be so kind as to speak only four at a time?”
—Sophie Swetchine
Each moment, as it passes, is the meeting place of two eternities.
—Sophie Swetchine
Topics: Time
It is a little stream which flows softly, but it freshens everything along its course.
—Sophie Swetchine
Topics: Moderation
Providence has hidden a charm in difficult undertakings, which is appreciated only by those who dare to grapple with them.
—Sophie Swetchine
He who has never denied himself for the sake of giving, has but glanced at the joys of charity.
—Sophie Swetchine
Topics: Charity
We deceive ourselves when we fancy that only weakness needs support. Strength needs it far more.
—Sophie Swetchine
Topics: Strength
We expect everything and are prepared for nothing.
—Sophie Swetchine
Topics: Expectation
There is a transcendent power in example. We reform others unconsciously, when we walk uprightly.
—Sophie Swetchine
Topics: Reform, Example, Correction
We are rich only through what we give; and poor only through what we refuse and keep.
—Sophie Swetchine
Topics: Charity, Giving
We forgive too little; forget too much.
—Sophie Swetchine
Topics: Forgiveness
As we advance in life the circle of our pains enlarges, while that of our pleasures contracts.
—Sophie Swetchine
Topics: Age
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