wisdom quotes

Teach us that wealth is not elegance, that profusion is not magnificence, that splendor is not beauty.

The fox has many tricks. The hedgehog has but one. But that is the best of all.

The higher the sun ariseth, the less shadow doth he cast; even so the greater is the goodness, the less doth it covet praise; yet cannot avoid its rewards in honours.

More helpful than all wisdom is one draught of simple human pity that will not forsake us.

I say, beware of all enterprises that require new clothes, and not rather a new wearer of clothes.

The career of a sage is of two kinds: He is either honored by all in the world, Like a flower waving its head, Or else he disappears into the silent forest.

You know, my Grandpop Finnegan used to have an expression: he used to say, ‚Joey, the guy in Olyphant’s out of work, it’s an economic slowdown. When your brother-in-law’s out of work, it’s a recession. When you’re out of work, it’s a depression.‘

Nothing astonishes men so much as common sense and plain dealing.

The sage does not hoard. The more he helps others, the more he benefits himself, The more he gives to others, the more he gets himself. The Way of Heaven does one good but never does one harm. The Way of the sage is to act but not to compete.

A scholar who cherishes the love of comfort is not fit to be deemed a scholar.

Old age is just a record of one’s whole life.

All my life I’ve been taught how to die, but no one ever taught me how to grow old.

Next to knowing when to seize an opportunity, the most important thing in life is to know when to forego an advantage.

Before a man speaks it is always safe to assume that he is a fool. After he speaks, it is seldom necessary to assume it.

We are wiser than we know.

Ask an older person you respect to tell you his or her greatest regret.

A lot of psychological principles and even medical principles, you see them coming around to what the Bible said hundreds of years ago: a merry heart is good like a medicine.

When a man fell into his anecdotage it was a sign for him to retire from the world.

In the vain laughter of folly wisdom hears half its applause.

In a magazine, one can get – from cover to cover – 15 to 20 different ideas about life and how to live it.

Without stirring abroad, One can know the whole world; Without looking out of the window One can see the way of heaven. The further one goes The less one knows.

Knowledge is knowing that we cannot know.

Don’t get older just to get wiser. If you get older, you will be wiser, I believe that – if you dare. But get older because it’s fun!

Men always talk about the most important things to perfect strangers. In the perfect stranger we perceive man himself; the image of a God is not disguised by resemblances to an uncle or doubts of wisdom of a mustache.

I had given up some youth for knowledge, but my gain was more valuable than the loss.

If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be.

None are so old as those who have outlived enthusiasm.

Govern a great nation as you would cook a small fish. Do not overdo it.

If we don’t plant the right things, we will reap the wrong things. It goes without saying. And you don’t have to be, you know, a brilliant biochemist and you don’t have to have an IQ of 150. Just common sense tells you to be kind, ninny, fool. Be kind.

No matter how long he lives, no man ever becomes as wise as the average woman of forty-eight.

Many a good hanging prevents a bad marriage.

To know yet to think that one does not know is best; Not to know yet to think that one knows will lead to difficulty.

Sincere words are not fine; fine words are not sincere.

Any fool can make a rule, and any fool will mind it.

My lectures, based on Islamic teachings, were on various subjects. Some of the titles were, ‚The Intoxication of Life,‘ ‚The Purpose of Life,‘ ‚The Real Cause of Man’s Distress,‘ ‚The Journey to the Goal in Life,‘ and, one of my favorites, ‚The Heart of Man.‘ They contained important insights that spoke to something deep inside me.

An inconvenience is an adventure wrongly considered.

When words are scarce they are seldom spent in vain.

The Tao that can be told is not the eternal Tao; the name that can be named is not the eternal name. The Nameless is the origin of Heaven and Earth; the Named is the mother of all things.

Before we acquire great power we must acquire wisdom to use it well.

A professor must have a theory as a dog must have fleas.

Having nothing, nothing can he lose.

You will find as you grow older that courage is the rarest of all qualities to be found in public life.

That’s what a man wants in a wife, mostly; he wants to make sure one fool tells him he’s wise.

Give thy thoughts no tongue.

I hope our wisdom will grow with our power, and teach us, that the less we use our power the greater it will be.

Women always excel men in that sort of wisdom which comes from experience. To be a woman is in itself a terrible experience.

‚Suffering should not make us bitter people,‘ my mother once said, ‚it should make us better comforters.‘ Young people need to hear this from those who have walked before them, because someday they’ll be walking those same steps, but there may not be anyone following behind.

I’m grateful to intelligent people. That doesn’t mean educated. That doesn’t mean intellectual. I mean really intelligent. What black old people used to call ‚mother wit‘ means intelligence that you had in your mother’s womb. That’s what you rely on. You know what’s right to do.

No man who worships education has got the best out of education… Without a gentle contempt for education no man’s education is complete.

The more extensive a man’s knowledge of what has been done, the greater will be his power of knowing what to do.

Where knowledge ends, religion begins.

The best advice comes from people who don’t give advice.

It is a characteristic of wisdom not to do desperate things.

We cannot learn men from books.

Happy is the hearing man; unhappy the speaking man.

It is only when we forget all our learning that we begin to know.

I have always been regretting that I was not as wise as the day I was born.

It is best to avoid the beginnings of evil.

Leave it as it is. The ages have been at work on it and man can only mar it.

All difficult things have their origin in that which is easy, and great things in that which is small.