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57 quotes that mention wisdom in so many words. Each one is checked against the book it comes from.
All human wisdom is summed up in these two words,—‘Wait and hope.’
Early to bed, and early to rise, makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise
Fools make feasts, and wise men eat them.
It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness
A wise man will make more opportunities, than he finds.
Wisely and slow; they stumble that run fast.
The fool doth think he is wise, but the wise man knows himself to be a fool.
It is far easier to be wise for others than to be so for oneself.
He is really wise who is nettled at nothing.
Who lives without folly is not so wise as he thinks.
In growing old we become more foolish—and more wise.
It is great folly to wish only to be wise.
Our wisdom is no less at the mercy of Fortune than our goods.
Wisdom lies only in truth.
The wise have much in common with one another.’ Æschylus.
The well-bred contradict other people. The wise contradict themselves.
In examinations the foolish ask questions that the wise cannot answer.
The road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom.
Prudence is a rich ugly old maid courted by Incapacity.
A fool sees not the same tree that a wise man sees.
The hours of folly are measured by the clock, but of wisdom no clock can measure.
If the fool would persist in his folly he would become wise.
The wrath of the lion is the wisdom of God.
The selfish smiling fool and the sullen frowning fool shall be both thought wise that they may be a rod.
The tigers of wrath are wiser than the horses of instruction.
ADAGE, n. Boned wisdom for weak teeth.
APHORISM, n. Predigested wisdom.
BIGAMY, n. A mistake in taste for which the wisdom of the future will adjudge a punishment called trigamy.
CABBAGE, n. A familiar kitchen-garden vegetable about as large and wise as a man’s head.
CONTEMPT, n. The feeling of a prudent man for an enemy who is too formidable safely to be opposed.
EDUCATION, n. That which discloses to the wise and disguises from the foolish their lack of understanding.
EXPERIENCE, n. The wisdom that enables us to recognize as an undesirable old acquaintance the folly that we have already embraced.
FASHION, n. A despot whom the wise ridicule and obey.
NIRVANA, n. In the Buddhist religion, a state of pleasurable annihilation awarded to the wise, particularly to those wise enough to understand it.
ROSTRUM, n. In Latin, the beak of a bird or the prow of a ship. In America, a place from which a candidate for office energetically expounds the wisdom, virtue and power of the rabble.
The constancy of the wise is only the talent of concealing the agitation of their hearts.
It would seem that nature, which has so wisely ordered the organs of our body for our happiness, has also given us pride to spare us the mortification of knowing our imperfections.
There is no praise we have not lavished upon Prudence; and yet she cannot assure to us the most trifling event.
Few are sufficiently wise to prefer censure which is useful to praise which is treacherous.
Numberless arts appear foolish whose secret motives are most wise and weighty.
Vices enter into the composition of virtues as poison into that of medicines. Prudence collects and blends the two and renders them useful against the ills of life.
Folly follows us at all stages of life. If one appears wise ‘tis but because his folly is proportioned to his age and fortune.
The sage as ASTRONOMER.—So long as thou feelest the stars as an “above thee,” thou lackest the eye of the discerning one.
It is only men of practical ability, knowing their powers and using them with moderation and prudence, who will be successful in worldly affairs.
Whoso is content with pure experience and acts upon it has enough of truth. The growing child is wise in this sense.
There is no piece of foolishness but it can be corrected by intelligence or accident; no piece of wisdom but it can miscarry by lack of intelligence or by accident.
Fools and wise folk are alike harmless. It is the half-wise, and the half-foolish, who are the most dangerous.
An intelligent man finds almost everything ridiculous, a wise man hardly anything.
It would not be worth while to see seventy years if all the wisdom of this world were foolishness with God.
It is not the intelligent man who rules, but intelligence; not the wise man, but wisdom.
What is predestination? It is this: God is mightier and wiser than we are, and so he does with us as he pleases.
The saying that no one who is unacquainted with or a stranger to geometry should enter the philosopher’s school, does not mean that a man must become a mathematician to attain the wisdom of the world.
The Duc de Sully observes very justly, in his Memoirs, that nothing contributed more to his rise, than that prudent economy which he had observed from his youth, and by which he had always a sum of money beforehand, in case of emergencies.
Take care always to form your establishment so much within your income as to leave a sufficient fund for unexpected contingencies and a prudent liberality. There is hardly a year, in any man’s life, in which a small sum of ready money may not be employed to great advantage.
Behold, the fool saith, “Put not all thine eggs in the one basket”—which is but a manner of saying, “Scatter your money and your attention;” but the wise man saith, “Put all your eggs in the one basket and—watch that basket”
We should be careful to get out of an experience only the wisdom that is in it—and stop there; lest we be like the cat that sits down on a hot stove-lid. She will never sit down on a hot stove-lid again—and that is well; but also she will never sit down on a cold one any more.
It is by the goodness of God that in our country we have those three unspeakably precious things: freedom of speech, freedom of conscience, and the prudence never to practice either of them.