Oráculo manual y arte de prudencia (literally The Oracle, a Manual of the Art of Discretion)

Baltasar Gracián y Morales, SJ ( 1601 – 1658) was a Spanish Jesuit and baroque prose writer. He was born in Belmonte, near Calatayud (Aragon). His proto-existentialist writings were lauded by Nietzsche and Schopenhauer.

Oráculo manual y arte de prudencia (literally The Oracle, a Manual of the Art of Discretion), commonly translated as  Art of Worldly Wisdom is almost entirely composed of three hundred maxims with commentary. He constantly plays with words: each phrase becomes a puzzle, using the most diverse rhetorical devices.

Its appeal has endured: in 1992, Christopher Maurer's translation of this book remained 18 weeks (2 weeks in first place) in the Washington Post's list of Nonfiction General Best Sellers. It has sold nearly 200,000 copies.

The 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica wrote of Gracián that "He has been excessively praised by Schopenhauer, whose appreciation of the author induced him to translate the Oráculo manual … He is an acute thinker and observer, misled by his systematic misanthropy and by his fantastic literary theories."

Nietzsche wrote of the Oráculo, "Europe has never produced anything finer or more complicated in matters of moral subtlety," and Schopenhauer, who translated it into German, considered the book "Absolutely unique... a book made for constant use...a companion for life" for "those who wish to prosper in the great world." A translation of the Oraculo manual from the Spanish by Joseph Jacobs (London: Macmillan and Co., Limited), first published in 1892, was a huge commercial success, with many reprintings over the years (most recently by Shambala). Jacobs’ translation is alleged to have been read by Winston Churchill, seven years later, on the ship taking him to the Boer Wars.

Attempt easy tasks as if they were difficult, and difficult as if they were easy; in the one case that confidence may not fall asleep, in the other that it may not be dismayed.
Baltasar Gracian

The sole advantage of power is that you can do more good.
Baltasar Gracian, The Art of Worldly Wisdom, 1647

It is better to sleep on things beforehand than lie awake about them afterward.
Baltasar Gracian

Know how to ask. There is nothing more difficult for some people, nor for others, easier.
Baltasar Gracian

Never do anything when you are in a temper, for you will do everything wrong.
Baltasar Gracian

Put yourself on view. This brings your talents to light.
Baltasar Gracian

The great art of giving consists in this: the gift should cost very little and yet be greatly coveted, so that it may be the more highly appreciated.
Baltasar Gracian