Motivational Quotes

Wisdom

It seems to me that, in every culture, I come across a chapter headed Wisdom. And then I know exactly what is going to follow: Vanity of vanities, all is vanity.

- Wittgenstein, Ludwig

Best Quotes about Wisdom

Wisdom is the principal thing; therefore get wisdom; and with all your getting get understanding.

Bible

The wise man sees in the misfortune of others what he should avoid.

Aurelius, Marcus

A nation's treasure is its scholars.

Proverb, Yiddish

Timing, degree and conviction are the three wise men in this life.

Fitzhenry, R. I.

Wise men still seek Him today.

Bell, Dan

Wisdom is always an overmatch for strength.

Phaedrus

Wisdom and knowledge shall be the stability of your times.

Bible

As irrigators lead water where they want, as archers make their arrows straight, as carpenters carve wood, the wise shape their minds.

Buddha

It is not wise to be wiser than necessary.

Quinault, Philippe

10.

The testimony of the Lord is sure making wise the simple. [Psalms 19:7]

Bible

11.

A wise man will see to it that his acts always seem voluntary and not done by compulsion, however much he may be compelled by necessity.

Machiavelli, Niccolo

12.

When you move amidst the world of sense, free from attachment and aversion alike, there comes the peace in which all sorrows end, and you life in the wisdom of the Self.

Bhagavad Gita

13.

It is great folly to wish to be wise all alone.

La Rochefoucauld, Francois De

14.

True wisdom comes to each of us when we realize how little we understand about life, ourselves, and the world around us.

Socrates

15.

Follow then the shining ones, the wise, the awakened, the loving, for they know how to work and forbear.

Buddha

16.

Wisdom is not finally tested in the schools, Wisdom cannot be pass'd from one having it to another not having it, Wisdom is of the soul, is not susceptible of proof, is its own proof.

Walt Whitman

17.

The ultimate wisdom which deals with beginnings, remains locked in a seed. There it lies, the simplest fact of the universe and at the same time the one which calls faith rather than reason.

Borland, Hal

18.

We don't receive wisdom; we must discover it for ourselves after a journey that no one can take for us or spare us.

Marcel Proust

19.

Even though you know a thousand things, ask the man who knows one.

Proverb, Turkish

20.

The ear that heareth the reproof of life abideth among the wise. [Proverbs 15: 31]

Bible

21.

To acquire knowledge, one must study; but to acquire wisdom, one must observe.

Marilyn vos Savant

22.

Wisdom alone is the science of others sciences.

Plato

23.

Who is a wise man? He who learns of all men.

Talmud, The

24.

The only man I know who behaves sensibly is my tailor; he takes my measurements anew each time he sees me. The rest go on with their old measurements and expect me to fit them.

Shaw, George Bernard

25.

Wise men learn more from fools than fools from the wise.

Cato The Elder

26.

Let no man deceive himself. If any man among you seemeth to be wise in this world, let him become a fool, that he may be wise. For the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God. [1 Corinthians 3:18-19]

Bible

27.

The foolish sayings of a rich man pass for wise ones.

Proverb, Spanish

28.

Experiences are savings which a miser puts aside. Wisdom is an inheritance which a wastrel cannot exhaust.

Kraus, Karl

29.

Though wisdom cannot be gotten for gold, still less can be gotten without it.

Butler, Samuel

30.

There is a time when a man distinguishes the idea of felicity from the idea of wealth; it is the beginning of wisdom.

Emerson, Ralph Waldo

31.

The only one who is wiser than anyone is everyone.

Bonaparte, Napoleon

32.

The only thing that we know is that we know nothing and that is the highest flight of human wisdom.

Tolstoy, Count Leo

33.

Knowledge comes, but wisdom lingers. It may not be difficult to store up in the mind a vast quantity of face within a comparatively short time, but the ability to form judgments requires the severe discipline of hard work and the tempering heat of experience and maturity.

Coolidge, Calvin

34.

We can be knowledgeable with other men's knowledge, but we cannot be wise with other men's wisdom.

Montaigne, Michel Eyquem De

35.

Let us not take ourselves too seriously. None of us has a monopoly on wisdom.

Elizabeth, Queen

36.

The greatest wisdom is to realize one's lack of it

Stanislavisky, Konstantin

37.

The wise person has long ears and a short tongue.

Proverb, German

38.

A single conversation across the table with a wise man is worth a month's study of books.

Proverb, Chinese

39.

No one over thirty-five is worth meeting who has not something to teach us, --something more than we could learn for ourselves, from a book.

Connolly, Cyril

40.

Without wisdom, knowledge is more stupid than ignorance.

41.

The man who questions opinions is wise. The man who quarrels with facts is a fool.

Garbutt, Frank

42.

The growth of wisdom may be gauged exactly by the diminution of ill temper.

Nietzsche, Friedrich

43.

He who exercises wisdom exercises the knowledge which is about God.

Epictetus

44.

One of the greatest pieces of economic wisdom is to know what you do not know.

Galbraith, John Kenneth

45.

Well I am certainly wiser than this man. It is only too likely that neither of us has any knowledge to boast of; but he thinks that he knows something which he does not know, whereas I am quite conscious of my ignorance. At any rate it seems that I am wiser than he is to this small extent, that I do not think that I know what I do not know.

Socrates

46.

Good people are good because they've come to wisdom through failure. We get very little wisdom from success, you know.

Saroyan, William

47.

What is the price of experience? Do men buy it for a song? Or wisdom for a dance in the street? No, it is bought with the price of all the man hath, his house, his wife, his children.

Blake, William

48.

Many people might have attained wisdom had they not assumed they already had it.

49.

There is more wisdom in your body than in your deepest philosophy.

Nietzsche, Friedrich

50.

Wisdom is your perspective on life, your sense of balance, your understanding of how the various parts and principles apply and relate to each other. It embraces judgment, discernment, comprehension. It is a gestalt or oneness, and integrated wholeness.

Covey, Stephen R.