Motivational Quotes

Wisdom

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

Best Quotes about Wisdom

The price of wisdom is eternal thought.

Birch, Frank

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

Proverb, Chinese

It is not wise to be wiser than necessary.

Quinault, Philippe

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

Montaigne, Michel Eyquem De

Inner wisdom is more important than wealth. The more you spend it, the more you gain.

Oprah Winfrey

Everything I know I learned after I was thirty.

Clemenceau, Georges

Suppose that we are wise enough to learn and know -- and yet not wise enough to control our learning and knowledge, so that we use it to destroy ourselves? Even if that is so, knowledge remains better than ignorance. It is better to know -- even if the knowledge endures only for the moment that comes before destruction -- than to gain eternal life at the price of a dull and swinish lack of comprehension of a universe that swirls unseen before us in all its wonder. That was the choice of Achilles, and it is mine, too.

Asimov, Isaac

The wise person has long ears and a short tongue.

Proverb, German

Do not seek to follow in the footsteps of the wise. Seek what they sought.

Basho, Matsuo

10.

The doors of wisdom are never shut.

Franklin, Benjamin

11.

Wisdom is better than weapons of war. [9:18b, Ecclesiastes]

Bible

12.

Among mortals second thoughts are wisest.

Euripides

13.

The greatest event for the world is the arrival of a new and wise person.

Carlyle, Thomas

14.

As it is the characteristic of great wits to say much in few words, so small wits seem to have the gift of speaking much and saying nothing.

La Rochefoucauld, Francois De

15.

We have no words for speaking of wisdom to the stupid. He who understands the wise is wise already.

Lichtenberg, Georg C.

16.

Wisdom not only gets, but once got, retains.

Quarles, Francis

17.

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

Garbutt, Frank

18.

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

Cheever, John

19.

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

20.

Blessed is the man who finds wisdom, the man who gains understanding, for she is more profitable than silver and yields better returns than gold. She is more precious than rubies; nothing you desire can compare with her. [Proverbs 3:13-15]

Bible

21.

The wise man says it cannot be done, but the fool goes and does it.

22.

I have known it for a long time but I have only just experienced it. Now I know it not only with my intellect, but with my eyes, with my heart, with my stomach.

Hesse, Hermann

23.

A nation's treasure is its scholars.

Proverb, Yiddish

24.

The beginning of wisdom is to desire it.

Gabirol, Ibn

25.

This is the highest wisdom that I own; freedom and life are earned by those alone who conquer them each day anew.

Goethe, Johann Wolfgang Von

26.

Wisdom alone is the science of others sciences.

Plato

27.

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

Proverb, Spanish

28.

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

29.

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

30.

Society cannot exist unless a controlling power upon will and appetite be placed somewhere, and the less of it there is within, the more there must be without.

Edmund Burke

31.

If I don't have wisdom, I can teach you only ignorance.

Buscaglia, Leo

32.

Beauty is the wisdom of women. Wisdom is the beauty of men.

Proverb, Chinese

33.

It's the height of folly to want to be the only wise one.

La Rochefoucauld, Francois De

34.

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

Larson, Doug

35.

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

Aurelius, Marcus

36.

Nine times out of ten it is over the Bridge of Sighs that we pass the narrow gulf from youth to manhood. That interval is usually marked by an ill placed or disappointed affection. We recover and we find ourselves a new being. The intellect has become hardened by the fire through which it has passed. The mind profits by the wrecks of every passion, and we may measure our road to wisdom by the sorrows we have undergone.

Bulwer-Lytton, Edward G.

37.

Mixing one's wines may be a mistake, but old and new wisdom mix admirably.

Brecht, Bertolt

38.

Bible

39.

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

Butler, Samuel

40.

Wisdom is the power to put our time and our knowledge to the proper use.

Watson, Thomas J.

41.

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

Montaigne, Michel Eyquem De

42.

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

Goldsmith, Oliver

43.

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

Socrates

44.

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

45.

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

46.

Wisdom is found only in truth.

Goethe, Johann Wolfgang Von

47.

We cannot advance without new experiments in living, but no wise man tries every day what he has proved wrong the day before.

Adams, James Truslow

48.

Wisdom doesn't necessarily come with age. Sometimes age just shows up all by itself.