Wise quotes
5.1K quotes on this topic — from poets, philosophers, and thinkers across history.
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"We are rare and precious because we are alive, because we can think as well as we can. We are privileged to influence and perhaps control our future. I believe we have an obligation to fight for life on Earth - not just for ourselves, but for all those, humans and others, who came before us, and to whom we are beholden, and for all those who, if we are wise enough, will come after."
"The prediction I can make with the highest confidence is that the most amazing discoveries will be the ones we are not today wise enough to foresee."
"If the way which I have pointed out as leading to this result (i.e., power over the emotions by which the wise man surpasses the ignorant man) seems exceedingly hard, it may nevertheless be discovered. Needs must it be hard, since it is so seldom found. How would it be possible, if salvation were ready to our hand, and could without great labour be found, that it should be by almost all men neglected? But all things excellent are as difficult as they are rare."
"In his face there came to be a brooding peace that is seen most often in the faces of the very sorrowful or the very wise. But still he wandered through the streets of the town, always silent and alone."
"Customs may not be as wise as laws, but they are always more popular."
"In the old legend the wise men finally boiled down the history of mortal affairs into a single phrase: 'This too will pass.'"
"A quarrelsome man has no good neighbours."
"Search others for their virtues, thyself for thy vices."
"A change of fortune hurts a wise man no more than a change of the moon."
"The wise man draws more advantage from his enemies than the fool from his friends"
"Fools make feasts and wise men eat them."
"In prosperous fortunes be modest and wise, The greatest may fall, and the lowest may rise: But insolent People that fall in disgrace, Are wretched and nobody pities their Case."
"The good Education of Youth has been esteemed by wise Men in all Ages, as the surest Foundation of the Happiness both of private Families and of Common-wealths. Almost all Governments have therefore made it a principal Object of their Attention, to establish and endow with proper Revenues, such Seminaries of Learning, as might supply the succeeding Age with Men qualified to serve the Publick with Honour to themselves, and to their Country."
"It is wise to turn circumstances to good account."
"We often despise what is most useful to us."
"Let there be wealth without tears; enough for the wise man who will ask no further."
"A wise man, therefore, proportions his belief to the evidence."
"In our reasonings concerning matter of fact, there are all imaginable degrees of assurance, from the highest certainty to the lowest species of moral evidence. A wise man, therefore, proportions his belief to the evidence."
"It is harder to avoid censure than to gain applause; for this may be done by one great or wise action in an age. But to escape censure a man must pass his whole life without saying or doing one ill or foolish thing"
"God is an ever-present spirit guiding all that happens to a wise and holy end."
