One person with a belief is equal to a force of ninety-nine who have only interests.
John Stuart Mill
1. "Lots of white people think black people are stupid. They are stupid themselves for thinking so, but regulation will not make them smarter."
Stephen Carter, "Reflections of an Affirmative Action Baby"
Other categories: Various
2. "A spoon does not know the taste of soup, nor a learned fool the taste of wisdom."
Welsh proverb
3. "We may give wise advice, but we cannot give wisdom to follow it."
(?)
4. "Nine-tenths of wisdom consists in being wise in time."
Eleanor Roosevelt
5. "Many people would sooner die than think; In fact, they do so."
Bertrand Russell
Other categories: Intellect, Judgement
6. "Seriousness is stupidity sent to college."
P.J. O`Rourke, "Give War A Chance"
7. "A fine quotation is a diamond on the finger of a man of wit, and a pebble in the hand of a fool."
Joseph Roux
Other categories: Wit and Humor
8. "The increase in wisdom can be measured precisely by the decrease in bile."
Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche
9. "Genius unrefined resembles a flash of lightning, but wisdom is like the sun."
Franz Grillparzer, "Notebooks and Diaries"
Other categories: Talent and Genius
10. "Experience is the teacher of all things."
Julius Caesar
Other categories: Education
11. "There is no such thing as the old age of the wise."
Sophocles
Other categories: Youth and Age
12. "A country can be judged by the quality of its proverbs."
German proverb
Other categories: History and Nations
13. "It is dangerous to be sincere unless you are also stupid."
George Bernard Shaw, "Man and Superman"
Other categories: Manners and Ethics
14. "Everything of importance has been said before by somebody who did not discover it."
Alfred North Whitehead
Other categories: Various
15. "Readers are plentiful: thinkers are rare."
Harriet Martineau
Other categories: Knowledge, Ignorance
16. "Metaphysics means nothing but an unusually obstinate effort to think clearly."
William James, "Principles of Psychology"
Other categories: Knowledge, Ignorance
17. "Experience is a good teacher, but she sends in terrific bills."
Minna Antrim, "Naked Truth and Veiled Allusions"
Other categories: Education
18. "Logical consequences are the scarecrows of fools and the beacons of wise men."
Thomas Henry Huxley, "Science and Culture"
19. "From the earliest times the old have rubbed it into the young that they are wiser than they, and before the young had discovered what nonsense this was they were old too, and it profited them to carry on the imposture."
William Somerset Maugham, "Cakes and Ale"
Other categories: Youth and Age
20. "Experience comprises illusions lost, rather than wisdom gained."
Joseph Roux, "Meditations of a Parish Priest"
Other categories: Various
21. "Superstition sets the whole world in flames; philosophy quenches them."
François-Marie Arouet (Voltaire)
Other categories: Science and Technology
22. "Proverbs are always platitudes until you have personally experienced the truth of them."
Aldous Huxley, "Jesting Pilate"
Other categories: Truth and Falsity
23. "When I disagree with a rational man, I let reality be our final arbiter; if I am right, he will learn; if I am wrong, I will; one of us will win, but both will profit."
Ayn Rand, "Atlas Shrugged"
Other categories: Reality and Imagination -:- Question and Problem
24. "The wisdom of the wise, and the experience of ages, may be preserved by quotation."
Benjamin Disraeli
Other categories: Various
25. "By the time a man realizes that maybe his father was right, he usually has a son who thinks he's wrong."
Charles Wadsworth
Other categories: Youth and Age
26. "Cats are smarter than dogs. You can't get eight cats to pull a sled through snow."
Jeff Valdez
Other categories: Nature and Animals
27. "Wisdom is what's left after we've run out of personal opinions."
Cullen Hightower
28. "Life is so constructed that we move through different phases and stages, each requiring the skills and wisdom of the previous ones."
Anne Wilson Schaef
Other categories: Life and Death -:- Education
29. "Get all the fools on your side and you can be elected to anything."
Frank Dane
Other categories: Politics and Diplomacy
30. "Any fool can criticize, condemn, and complain - and most fools do."
Andrew Carnegie
31. "Any fool can make a rule, and any fool will mind it."
Henry David Thoreau
32. "You will do foolish things, but do them with enthusiasm."
Sidonie-Gabrielle Colette
33. "Wisdom does not trust to probabilities; it always marches in the midday light of reason."
Baltasar Gracian
Other categories: Intellect, Judgement
34. "Before God we are all equally wise - and equally foolish."
Albert Einstein
Other categories: God and Religion
35. "The thoughts we choose to think are the tools we use to paint the canvas of our lives."
Louise Hay
Other categories: Life and Death
36. "As many heads as many wits."
Scottish proverb
Other categories: Wit and Humor
37. "A fool is like all other men as long as he remains silent."
Danish proverb
Other categories: Oration and Silence
38. "Think much, speak little, write less."
French proverb
39. "Wisdom is the right use of knowledge."
Charles Spurgeon
Other categories: Knowledge, Ignorance
40. "Proverb - a definition ... The wisdom of many and the wit of one."
John Russell, 1st Earl Russell
Other categories: Various -:- Wit and Humor
41. "The only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing."
Socrates
42. "Women are wiser than men because they know less and understand more."
James Thurber
Other categories: Woman and Man
43. "A wise man sees as much as he should, not as much as he can."
(?)
44. "Never argue with a stupid person. First they'll drag you down to their level, then they will beat you with experience."
(?)
45. "Wisdom tends to grow in proportion to one's awareness of one's ignorance."
Anthony de Mello
Other categories: Knowledge, Ignorance
46. "Turn your wounds into wisdom."
Oprah Winfrey
Other categories: Pain and Tears
47. "TV and the Internet are good because they keep stupid people from spending too much time out in public."
Douglas Coupland, "JPod"
Other categories: Science and Technology
48. "There is more stupidity than hydrogen in the universe, and it has a longer shelf life."
Frank Zappa, "The Real Frank Zappa Book"
49. "A wise person has something to say, a fool has to say something."
(?)
Other categories: Oration and Silence
50. "The silence of a wise man is always meaningful."
Leo Strauss
Other categories: Oration and Silence
2007, collected and compiled by Kazimierz Matan
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