A sheer white cloth floats above an empty red armchair in a dark room lit by moonlight through a tall window.

Original artwork, not a still

Maxim 76

François de la Rochefoucauld

True love is like ghosts, which everybody talks about and few have seen.

Behind the line

What it means

Our interpretation.

True love is compared to something people discuss much more often than they see. Ghosts give that doubt a playful shape. The remark questions how often the romantic ideal turns up in life, even while acknowledging how readily people talk about it.

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