Quotes on Wisdom

A wise man first thinks and then speaks and a fool speaks first and then thinks.

Within seconds thoughts become words that slip off our tongue and into the world. Pausing before we speak may seem cumbersome, but it allows us to decide: Is this helpful? Does this need to be said now? What is the best way to say this?

Our dignity is not in what we do, but what we understand.

If we did not bring to the examinations of our instincts a knowledge of their comparative dignity we could never learn it from them.

The only power any government has is the power to crack down on criminals. Well, when there aren't enough criminals, one makes them. One declares so many things to be a crime that it becomes impossible for men to live without breaking laws.

Those base men who speak of the secret faults of others destroy themselves like serpents that stray onto anthills.

This is my simple religion. There is no need for temples; no need for complicated philosophy. Our own brain, our own heart is our temple; the philosophy is kindness.

There is no conversation more boring than the one where everybody agrees.

He is no wise man who will quit a certainty for an uncertainty.

Nature abhors a vacuum, and if I can only walk with sufficient carelessness I am sure to be filled.

When you want wisdom and insight as badly as you want to breathe, it is then you shall have it.

We can know only that we know nothing. And that is the highest degree of human wisdom.

With realization of one's own potential and self-confidence in one's ability, one can build a better world.

History will have to record that the greatest tragedy of this period of social transition was not the strident clamor of the bad people, but the appalling silence of the good people.

I want to state upfront, unequivocally and without doubt: I do not believe that any racial, ethnic or gender group has an advantage in sound judging. I do believe that every person has an equal opportunity to be a good and wise judge, regardless of their background or life experiences.

We live on the brink of disaster because we do not know how to let life alone. We do not respect the living and fruitful contradictions and paradoxes of which true life is full.

The most excellent and divine counsel, the best and most profitable advertisement of all others, but the least practised, is to study and learn how to know ourselves. This is the foundation of wisdom and the highway to whatever is good. . . . God, Nature, the wise, the world, preach man, exhort him both by word and deed to the study of himself.

Experiences are savings which a miser puts aside. Wisdom is an inheritance which a wastrel cannot exhaust.

Cunning... is but the low mimic of wisdom.

This life is not real. I conquered the world and it did not bring me satisfaction.

There is a way of meeting error while on the road of truth.