Human affairs inspire in noble hearts only two feelings-admiration or pity.
Anatole FranceRead
Do not try to satisfy your vanity by teaching a great many things. Awaken people's curiosity. It is enough to open minds; do not overload them. Put there just a spark. If there is some good inflammable stuff, it will catch fire.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Encouraging curiosity is more effective than overwhelming others with information.
Anatole France emphasizes the importance of igniting curiosity in others rather than simply imparting vast amounts of knowledge. By inspiring a thirst for discovery and understanding, we enable the potential for deeper learning and personal growth, much like kindling a fire that can lead to greater enlightenment on its own.
Themes
CuriosityEducationLearningKnowledgeInspiration
In practice
Example use cases
In a classroom setting, a teacher might use this quote to emphasize the importance of engaging students rather than lecturing them.
More from Anatole France
All quotes βAwaken people's curiosity. It is enough to open minds, do not overload them. Put there just a spark.
Anatole FranceRead
In its majestic equality, the law forbids rich and poor alike to sleep under bridges, beg in the streets and steal loaves of bread.
Anatole FranceRead
Justice is the means by which established injustices are sanctioned
Anatole FranceRead
There is a certain impertinence in allowing oneself to be burned for an opinion.
Anatole FranceRead
Lovers who love truly do not write down their happiness.
Anatole FranceRead
Similar quotes
Writing engenders in us certain attitudes toward language. It encourages us to take words for granted. Writing has enabled us to store vast quantities of words indefinitely. This is advantageous on the one hand but dangerous on the other. The result is that we have developed a kind of false security where language is concerned, and our sensitivity to language has deteriorated. And we have become in proportion insensitive to silence.
N. Scott MomadayRead
There exists one book, which, to my taste, furnishes the happiest treatise of natural education. What then is this marvelous book? Is it Aristotle? Is it Pliny, is it Buffon? No-it is Robinson Crusoe.
Jean-Jacques RousseauRead
Nothing sickens me more than the closed door of a library.
Barbara TuchmanRead
Without initiation into the scientific spirit one is not in possession of the best tools which humanity has so far devised for effectively directed reflection. One in that case not merely conducts inquiry and learning without the use of the best instruments, but fails to understand the full meaning of knowledge.
John DeweyRead
It is the duty of the State to educate, and the right of the people to demand education.
Edmund BartonRead
Teaching's hard! You need different skills: positive reinforcement, keeping students from getting bored, commanding their attention in a certain way.
Bill GatesRead