wisdom

Who knows what evil lurks in the hearts of men? An older woman knows. But how much older do you have to get before you acquire that kind of wisdom?

—Atwood, Margaret Eleanor

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way.

—Dickens, CharlesJohn Huffam

So teach us to number our days that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom.

—Bible (Old Testament)

This having learnt, thou hast attained the sum Of wisdom; hope no higher, though all the stars Thou knew'st by name, and all th'ethereal powers, All secrets of the deep, all nature's works, Or works of God in heav'n, air, earth, or sea, And all the riches of this world enjoy'dst, And all the rule, one empire; onlyadd Deeds to thy knowledge answerable, add faith, Add virtue, patience, temperance, add love, By name to come called charity, the soul Of all the rest: then wilt thou not be loath To leave this Paradise, but shalt possess A paradise within thee, happier far.

—Milton,John

But I suppose even God was born too late to trust the old religionö all those settings out that never left the ground, beginning in wisdom, dying in doubt.

—Lowell, RobertTraill Spence,Jr

The fear of the L is the beginning of wisdom.

—Bible (Old Testament)

Axiome: la haine du bourgeois est le commencement de la vertu. Axiom: Hatred of the bourgeois is the beginning of wisdom.

—Flaubert, Gustave

The belief that we somehow moved on to something elseöwhether still recognisably ourselves, or quite thoroughly changedömight be a tribute to our evolutionary tenacityand our animal thirst for life, but not to our wisdom.

—Banks, Iain Menzies

Knowledge comes, but wisdom lingers, and I linger on the shore, And the individual withers, and the world is more and more.

—Tennyson

I amso far likethemidwifethat I cannot myself give birth to wisdom, and the common reproach is true, that, though I question others,I can myself bring nothing to light because there is no wisdom in me.

—Socrates

Government is a contrivance of human wisdom to provide for human wants.

—Burke, Edmund

All is best, though we oft doubt, What the unsearchable dispose Of highest wisdom brings about, And ever best found in the close.

—Milton,John

O impotence of mind, in body strong! But what is strength without a double share Of wisdom, vast, unwieldy, burdensome, Proudly secure, yet liable to fall By weakest subtleties, not made to rule, But to subserve where wisdom bears command.

—Milton,John

We cannot bring ourselves to believe it possible that a foreigner should in any respect be wiser than ourselves. If any such point out to us our follies, we at once claim those follies as the special evidence of our wisdom.

—Trollope, Anthony

The triumphs of the Crusades were thetriumphs of faith. But faith without wisdom is a dangerous thing.

—Runciman, Sir Steven

The childhood shows the man, As morning shows the day. Be famous then By wisdom; as thy empire must extend, So let extend thy mind o'er all the world.

—Milton,John

The historic destiny of the Irish is being fulfilled on the other side of the Atlantic, where they have settled in their millions, bringing with them all their ancient grudges and the melancholy of the bogs, but also their hard, ancient wisdom. Theyalone of the newcomers are never fora moment taken in by themultifarious frauds of modernity. They have been changed from peasants and soldiers into townsmen. They have learned some of the superficial habits of 'good citizenship', but at heart they remain the same adroit and joyless race that broke the hearts of all who ever tried to help them.

—Waugh, Evelyn Arthur StJohn

The most beautiful emotion we can experience is the mystical. It is the power of all true art and science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead. To know that what is impenetrable to us really exists, manifesting itself as the highest wisdom and the most radiant beauty, which ourdull faculties can comprehend only in their most primitive formsöthis knowledge, this feeling, isatthe centerof true religiousness.In thissense, and in this sense only, I belong to the rank of devoutly religious men.

—Einstein, Albert

Now that I am sixty, I see why the idea of elder wisdom has passed from currency.

—Updike,John Hoyer

The only infallible criterion of wisdom to vulgar judgementsösuccess.

—Burke, Edmund

   The Bishop gave vent to a long-drawn sigh. 'Did it ever occur to you to wonder why God created women?' he asked.'It's the one thing that tempts me at times to doubt His infinite goodness and wisdom.'

—Wall, Mervyn

For inmuchwisdomismuchgrief: and hethat increaseth knowledge increaseth sorrow.

—Bible (Old Testament)

The wisest of you men is he who has realized, like Socrates, that in respect of wisdom he is really worthless.

—Plato

And Jesus increased inwisdomand stature, and in favour with God and man.

—Bible (NewTestament)

Behold, thoudesiresttruth intheinward parts: and inthe hidden part thou shalt make me to know wisdom. Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean: wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.

—Bible (Old Testament)

'Tis thou, alone, who with thy mystic fan, Work'st more than Wisdom, Art, or Nature can, To rouse the sacred madness; and awake The frost-bound-blood, and spirits; and to make Them frantic with thy raptures, flashing through The soul, like lightning, and as active too.

—Herrick, Robert

There is no boundary line to art. Music is your own experience, your thoughts, your wisdom. If you don't live it, it won't come out of your horn.

—Parker, Charlie known as  'Bird'

Whatsoever thy hand findethto do; do it with thy might; for there is no work, nor device, nor knowledge, nor wisdom, in the grave, whither thou goest.

—Bible (Old Testament)

Of such wisdom, the poetic passion, the desire of beauty, the love of art for its own sake, has most. For art comes to you proposing frankly to give nothing but the highestquality toyourmomentsasthey pass,and simply for those moments'sake.

—Pater,Walter

Forgive and be happy. That is the ancient secret†the only wisdom ever to be attained.

—Prather, Hugh

The only wisdom we can hope to acquire Is the wisdom of humility: humility is endless.

—Eliot,T(homas) S(tearns)

Most of our pocket wisdom is conceived for the use of mediocre people, to discourage them from ambitious attempts, and generally console them in their mediocrity.

—Stevenson, Robert Louis

The road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom.

—Blake,William

More than at any other time in history, mankind faces a crossroads.One path leads to despair and utter hopelessness. The other, to total extinction. Let us pray we have the wisdom to choose correctly.

—Allen,Woody pseudonym of  Allen Stewart Konigsberg

It is the province of knowledge to speak, and it is the privilege of wisdom to listen.

—Holmes, Oliver Wendell

The greatest obstacle to being heroic is the doubt whether one may not be going to prove one's self a fool; the truest heroism is to resist the doubt; and the profoundest wisdom, to know when it ought to be resisted and when to be obeyed.

—Hawthorne, Nathaniel

Raphael paints wisdom; Handel sings it, Phidias carves it, Shakespeare writesit,Wren buildsit,Columbussailsit, Luther preaches it,Washington arms it,Watt mechanizes it.

—Emerson, RalphWaldo

Dead flies causethe ointment of theapothecary tosend forth a stinking savour: so doth a little folly him that is in reputation for wisdom and honour.

—Bible (Old Testament)

  'Some people', Miss R. said,'run to conceits or wisdom but I hold to the hard, brown, nutlike word. I might point out that there is enough aesthetic excitement here to satisfy anyone but a damned fool.'

—Barthelme, Donald

Science robs men of wisdom and usually converts them into phantom beings loaded up with facts.

—Unamuno, Miguel de

These unhappy people were proposing schemes for persuading monarchs to choose favourites upon the score of their wisdom, capacity and virtue; of teaching ministers to consult the public good; of rewarding merit, great abilities and eminent services; of instructing princes to know their true interest by placing it on the same foundation with that of their people: of choosing for employment persons qualified to exercise them; with many other wild impossible chimeras, that never entered before into the heart of man to conceive, and confirmed in me the old observation, that there is nothing so extravagant and irrational which some philosophers have not maintained for truth.

—Swift,Jonathan

   You seek for knowledge and wisdom as I once did; and I ardently hope that the gratification of your wishes may not be a serpent to sting you, as mine has been.

—Shelley, Mary Godwin

There are compensations for growing older.One is the realization that to be sporting isn't at all necessary. It is a great relief to reach this stage of wisdom.

—Skinner, Cornelia Otis

But hail thou Goddess sage and holy, Hail, divinest Melancholy, Whose saintly visage is too bright To hit the sense of human sight, And therefore to our weaker view O'erlaid with black, staid Wisdom's hue.

—Milton,John

It may almost be a question whether such wisdom as many of us have in our mature years has not come from the dying out of the power of temptation, rather than as the results of thought and resolution.

—Trollope, Anthony

The oldölike childrenötalk to themselves, for they have reached that hopeless wisdom of experience which knows that though one were to cry it in the streets to multitudes, or whisper it in the kiss to one's beloved, the onlyears that can ever hear one's secrets are one's own!

—O'Neill, Eugene Gladstone

There is a wisdom that is woe; but there is a woe that is madness.

—Melville, Herman

Books! 'tis a dull and endless strife: Come, hear the woodland linnet How sweet his music! on my life There's more of wisdom in it.

—Wordsworth,William

   But there's wisdom in women, of more than they have known, And thoughts go blowing through them, are wiser than their own.

—Brooke, Rupert Chawner

The good want power, but to weep barren tears. The powerful goodness want: worse need for them. The wise want love; and those who love want wisdom.

—Shelley, Percy Bysshe

We thought we were done with these things but we were wrong. We thought, because we had power, we had wisdom.

—Bene¤  t, StephenVincent

But knowledge is as food, and needs no less Her temperance over appetite, to know In measure what the mind may well contain, Oppresses else with surfeit, and soon turns Wisdom to folly, as nourishment to wind.

—Milton,John

Factsareventriloquist'sdummies. Sittingonawiseman's knee they may be made to utter words of wisdom; elsewhere they say nothing, or talk nonsense.

—Huxley, Aldous Leonard

On ne re c° oit pas la sagesse, il faut la de¤  couvrir soi-me"  me, apre'  s un trajet que personne ne peut faire pour nous, ne peut nous e¤  pargner. We do not receive wisdom.We must discover it ourselves after experiences which no one else can have for us and from which no one else can spare us.

—Proust, Marcel

And what isbettrethanwisedoom? Womman. And what is bettre than a good womman? Nothyng.

—Chaucer, Geoffrey

Wisdom and policy dictate that we must do as destiny demands and keep peace with the irresistible march of events.

—Napoleon I

Wisdom and Spirit of the universe! Thou soul, that art the eternity of thought, And giv'st to forms and images a breath And everlasting motion.

—Wordsworth,William

Thus with the year Seasons return, but not to me returns Day, or the sweet approach of ev'n or morn, Or sight of vernal bloom, or summer's rose, Or flocks, or herds, of human face divine; But cloud instead, and ever-during dark Surrounds me, from the cheerful ways of men Cut off, and for the book of knowledge fair Presented with a universal blank Of nature's works to me expunged and razed, And wisdom at one entrance quite shut out.

—Milton,John

Wisdom begins at the end.

—Webster,John

Does the eagle know what's in the pit Or wilt thou go ask the mole? Can wisdom be put in a silver rod, Or Love in a golden bowl.

—Blake,William

As therefore the state of man now is, what wisdom can there be to choose, what continence to forbear, without the knowledge of good and evil?

—Milton,John

La sagesse n'est pas dans la raison, mais dans l'amour. Wisdom comes not from reason but from love.

—Gide, Andre¤   Paul Guillaume

   Wisdom crieth without; she uttereth her voice in the streets.

—Bible (Old Testament)

Wisdom denotes the pursuing of the best ends by the best means.

—Hutcheson, Francis

Wisdom hath builded her house, she hath hewn out her seven pillars.

—Bible (Old Testament)

   All higher knowledge in her presence falls Degraded, wisdom in discourse with her Loses discount'nanced, and like folly shows.

—Milton,John

Knowledge dwells In heads replete with thoughts of other men; Wisdom in minds attentive to their own.

—Cowper,William

Homo liber de nulla re minus quam de morte cogitat; et ejus sapienta non mortis, sed vitae meditatio est. A free man thinks of nothing less than of death, and his wisdom is a meditation not of death but of life.

—Spinoza, Baruch also known as Benedict de Spinoza

Knowledge is proud that he has learned so much; Wisdom is humble that he knows no more.

—Cowper,William

But wisdom is justified of her children.

—Bible (NewTestament)

  Wisdom is the principal thing; therefore get wisdom: and with all thy getting get understanding.

—Bible (Old Testament)

   Wisdom we know is the knowledge of good and evilönot the strength to choose between the two.

—Cheever,JohnWilliam

Where is the Life we have lost in living? Where is the wisdom we have lost in knowledge? Where is the knowledge we have lost in information?

—Eliot,T(homas) S(tearns)

Happy is the man that findeth wisdom, and the man that gettethunderstanding.For themerchandise of it isbetter than the merchandise of silver, and the gain thereof than fine gold. She is more precious than rubies: and all the thingsthoucanst desirearenottobe compared untoher. Length of days is in her right hand; and in her left hand riches and honour. Her ways are ways of pleasantness, and all her paths are peace. She is a tree of life to them that lay hold upon her: and happy is every one that retaineth her.

—Bible (Old Testament)

The wisdom of a learned man cometh by opportunity of leisure: and he that hath little business shall become wise. How can he get wisdom that holdeth the plough, and that glorieth in the goad, that driveth oxen, and is occupied in their labours, and whose talk is of bullocks?

—Bible (Apocrypha)

The Pride of the peacock is the glory of God. The lust of the goat is the bounty of God. The wrath of the lion is the wisdom of God. The nakedness of woman is the work of God.

—Blake,William

Do not let me hear Of the wisdom of old men, but rather of their folly.

—Eliot,T(homas) S(tearns)

It is the wisdom of the crocodiles, that shed tears when they would devour.

—Bacon, Francis,Viscount St Albans

For insight into human affairs I turn to stories and poems rather than to sociology. This is the result of my upbringing and background.Iamnot abletomakeuse of the wisdom of the sociologists because I do not speak their language.

—Dyson, FreemanJ(ohn)

No doubt but ye are the people, and wisdom shall die with you.

—Bible (Old Testament)

Before us lay a painful road, And guidance have I sought in duteous love From Wisdom's heavenly Father. Hence hath flowed Patience, with trust that, whatsoe'er the way Each takes in this high matter, all may move Cheered with the prospect of a brighter day.

—Wordsworth,William

Virtue could see to do what Virtue would By her own radiant light, though sun and moon Were in the flat sea sunk. And Wisdom's self Oft seeks to sweet retired solitude, Where with her best nurse contemplation She plumes her feathers, and lets grow her wings That in the various bustle of resort Were all too ruffl'd, and sometimes impair'd. He that has light within his own clear breast May sit i'the centre, and enjoy bright day, But he that hides a dark soul, and foul thoughts Benighted walks under the midday sun; Himself is his own dungeon.

—Milton,John

Worldly wisdom teaches us that it is better for the reputation to fail conventionally than to succeed unconventionally.

—Keynes (of Tilton),John Maynard, 1st Baron

   God, giveusgracetoaccept with serenity thethingsthat cannot be changed, courage to change the things that should be changed, and the wisdom to distinguish the one from the other.

—Niebuhr, Reinhold

Wisdom without honesty is mere craft and cozenage. And therefore the reputation for honesty must first be gotten; which cannot be but by living well. A good life is a main argument.

—Jonson, Ben

With the ancient is wisdom; and in length of days understanding.

—Bible (Old Testament)

Forafter that inthewisdomof God theworld by wisdom knew not God, it pleased God by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe. Romans

—Bible (NewTestament)