Motivational Quotes

Wisdom

The mistakes of the fool are known to the world, but not to himself. The mistakes of the wise man are known to himself, but not to the world.

- Colton, Charles Caleb

Best Quotes about Wisdom

For it is not possible to join serpentine wisdom with columbine innocence, except men know exactly all the conditions of the serpent: his baseness and going upon his belly, his volubility and lubricity, his envy and sting, and the rest; that is, all forms and natures of evil: for without this, virtue lieth open and unfenced.

Bacon, Francis

The wise man can pick up a grain of sand and envision a whole universe. But the stupid man will just lay down on some seaweed and roll around in it until he's completely draped in it. Then he'll stand up and go hey, I'm Vine Man.

Handey, Jack

Those who wish to appear wise among fools, among the wise seem foolish.

Quintilian

Men are wise in proportion, not to their experience, but to their capacity for experience.

James Boswell

A man never reaches that dizzy height of wisdom that he can no longer be lead by the nose.

Twain, Mark

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

Some men are wise, and some are otherwise.

Smollett, Tobias G.

Now all the knowledge and wisdom that is in creatures, whether angels or men, is nothing else but a participation of that one eternal, immutable and increased wisdom of God, or several signatures of that one archetypal seal, or like so many multiplied reflections of one and the same face, made in several glasses, whereof some are clearer, some obscurer, some standing nearer, some further off.

Cudworth, Ralph J.

There are three methods to gaining wisdom. The first is reflection, which is the highest. The second is limitation, which is the easiest. The third is experience, which is the bitterest.

Confucius

10.

Just as a cautious businessman avoids investing all his capital in one concern, so wisdom would probably admonish us also not to anticipate all our happiness from one quarter alone.

Freud, Sigmund

11.

Wise are they who have learned these truths: Trouble is temporary. Time is a tonic. Tribulation is a test tube.

12.

Does wisdom perhaps appear on the earth as a raven which is inspired by the smell of carrion?

Nietzsche, Friedrich

13.

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

Butler, Samuel

14.

Raphael paints wisdom; Handel sings it, Phidias carves it, Shakespeare writes it, Wren builds it, Columbus sails it, Luther preaches it, Washington arms it, Watt mechanizes it.

Emerson, Ralph Waldo

15.

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

Proverb, Spanish

16.

Wise people are foolish if they cannot adapt to foolish people.

Montaigne, Michel Eyquem De

17.

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

Fitzhenry, R. I.

18.

The wisest man is he who does not fancy that he is so at all.

Boileau, Nicholas

19.

The beginning of wisdom is a definition of terms.

Socrates

20.

In seeking wisdom thou art wise; in imagining that thou hast attained it, thou art a fool.

Azai, Rabbi Ben

21.

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

22.

The wise person has long ears and a short tongue.

Proverb, German

23.

The Universe is one great kindergarten for man. Everything that exists has brought with it its own peculiar lesson. The mountain teaches stability and grandeur; the ocean immensity and change. Forests, lakes, and rivers, clouds and winds, stars and flowers, stupendous glaciers and crystal snowflakes, -- every form of animate or inanimate existence, leaves its impress upon the soul of man. Even the bee and ant have brought their little lessons of industry and economy.

Marden, Orison Swett

24.

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

Nietzsche, Friedrich

25.

The end result of wisdom is... good deeds.

Talmud, The

26.

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

Buddha

27.

Where there is charity and wisdom, there is neither fear nor ignorance. Where there is patience and humility, there is neither anger nor vexation. Where there is poverty and joy, there is neither greed nor avarice. Where there is peace and meditation, there is neither anxiety nor doubt.

Francis of Assisi, St.

28.

Wisdom hath her excesses, and no less need of moderation than folly.

Montaigne, Michel Eyquem De

29.

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

La Rochefoucauld, Francois De

30.

Wisdom is the reward you get for a lifetime of listening when you'd preferred to talk.

Larson, Doug

31.

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

Proverb, Turkish

32.

A wise woman puts a grain of sugar into everything she says to a man, and takes a grain of salt with everything he says to her.

Rowland, Helen

33.

Wisdom alone is the science of others sciences.

Plato

34.

By others faults the wise correct their own.

Proverb

35.

Wisdom is knowledge, rightly applied.

36.

Wise men still seek Him today.

Bell, Dan

37.

Wisdom we know is the knowledge of good and evil -- not the strength to choose between the two.

Cheever, John

38.

Wisdom is nothing more than healed pain.

Lee, Robert E.

39.

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

Buddha

40.

Wisdom makes a slow defense against trouble, though a sure one in the end.

Goldsmith, Oliver

41.

Through wisdom is a house built; and by understanding it is established; and by knowledge shall every room be filled with precious and pleasant riches.

Bible

42.

Wisdom and knowledge shall be the stability of your times.

Bible

43.

Wisdom not only gets, but once got, retains.

Quarles, Francis

44.

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

Epictetus

45.

The days that are still to come are the wisest witnesses.