Wisdom Quotes

500+ Sourced quotes

Collective wisdom, alas, is no adequate substitute for the intelligence of individuals. Individuals who opposed received opinions have been the source of all progress, both moral and intellectual. They have been unpopular, as was natural.

Bertrand Russell

Whatever bitterness and hate may be found in the movements which we are to examine, it is not bitterness or hate, but love, that is their mainspring. It is difficult not to hate those who torture the objects of our love. Though difficult, it is not impossible; but it requires a breadth of outlook and a comprehensiveness of understanding which are not easy to preserve amid a desperate contest. If ultimate wisdom has not always been preserved by Socialists and Anarchists, they have not differed in this from their opponents; and in the source of their inspiration they have shown themselves superior to those who acquiesce ignorantly or supinely in the injustices and oppressions by which the existing system is preserved.

Bertrand Russell

Honor Wisdom; and deny it not to them that would learn; and shew it unto them that dispraise it! Sow not the sea fields!

Where wisdom reigns, there is no conflict between thinking and feeling.

Religion is not 'doctrinal knowledge,' but wisdom born of personal experience.

I am much indebted to the good christian people of the country for their constant prayers and consolations; and to no one of them, more than to yourself. The purposes of the Almighty are perfect, and must prevail, though we erring mortals may fail to accurately perceive them in advance. We hoped for a happy termination of this terrible war long before this; but God knows best, and has ruled otherwise. We shall yet acknowledge His wisdom and our own error therein. Meanwhile we must work earnestly in the best light He gives us, trusting that so working still conduces to the great ends He ordains. Surely He intends some great good to follow this mighty convulsion, which no mortal could make, and no mortal could stay.

Abraham Lincoln

If it is God who gives the spirit of power and strength, then it is also the same God who gives the spirt of self-control, and if ignoble cowardice and fear of people are just as detestable in any age, the excess of eager enthusiasm, zeal without wisdom, are no less corrupting and at times are fundamentally just as detestable, just as blasphemous.

Søren Kierkegaard

All this worldly wisdom was once the unamiable heresy of some wise man.

Henry David Thoreau

Remind yourself that all men assert that wisdom is the greatest good, but that there are few who strenuously seek out that greatest good.

I am sure of this, that by going much alone a man will get more of a noble courage in thought and word than from all the wisdom that is in books.

Ralph Waldo Emerson

If thou fill thy brain with Boston and New York, with fashion and covetousness, and wilt stimulate thy jaded senses with wine and French coffee, thou shalt find no radiance of wisdom in the lonely waste of the pinewoods.

Ralph Waldo Emerson

The way of the superior man is threefold, but I have not been able to attain it. The man of wisdom has no perplexities; the man of humanity has no worry; the man of courage has no fear.

It should be of the pleasure of a poem itself to tell how it can. The figure a poem makes. It begins in delight and ends in wisdom. The figure is the same for love.

We must improve the relationship between China and Tibet as well as between Tibetans in and outside Tibet. With truth and equality as our foundation, we must try to develop friendship between Tibetans and Chinese through better understanding in the future. The time has come to apply our common wisdom in a spirit of tolerance and broadmindedness to achieve genuine happiness for the Tibetan people with a sense of urgency.
On my part, I remain committed to contribute my efforts for the welfare of all human beings, and in particular the poor and the weak to the best of my ability without any distinction based on national boundaries.

Tenzin Gyatso, 14th Dalai Lama

Wisdom comes not from reason but from love.

Just as a cautious businessman avoids tying up all his capital in one concern, so, perhaps, worldly wisdom will advise us not to look for the whole of our satisfaction from a single aspiration.

That so much time was wasted in this pain.
Ten thousand years ago he might have let off down
To not return again!
A dreadful laugh at last escapes his lips;
The laughter sets him free.
A Fool lives in the Universe! he cries.
The Fool is me!
And with one final shake of laughter
Breaks his bonds.
The nails fall skittering to marble floors.
And Christ, knelt at the rail, sees miracle
As Man steps down in amiable wisdom
To give himself what no one else can give:
His liberty.

Darling, replied Valentine, has not the count just told us that all human wisdom was contained in these two words,- "Wait and hope"?

Alexandre Dumas

Here was one with an air of high nobility such as Aragorn at times revealed, less high perhaps, yet also less incalculable and remote: one of the Kings of Men born into a later time, but touched with the wisdom and sadness of the Eldar Race. He knew now why Beregond spoke his name with love. He was a captain that men would follow, that he would follow, even under the shadow of the black wings.

J. R. R. Tolkien

He shall spurn fate, scorn death, and bear His hopes 'bove wisdom, grace and fear: And you all know, security Is mortals' chiefest enemy.

William Shakespeare

My hearers, this discourse has not wandered out into the world to look for conflict, it has not tried to get the better of anybody, it has not even tried to uphold anybody, as though there was battle without. It has spoken to you; not by way of explaining anything to you, but trying to speak secretly with you about your relationship to that secret wisdom mentioned in our text. Oh that nothing may upset you in respect to this, neither life nor death nor things present nor things to come nor any other creature (Romans 8:38) –not this discourse, which, though it may have profited you nothing, yet has striven for what after all is the first and the last, to help you have what the Scripture calls faith in yourself before God (Romans 14:22).

Søren Kierkegaard

The extreme limit of wisdom — that's what the public calls madness.

Stupidity and wisdom meet in the same centre of sentiment and resolution, in the suffering of human accidents.

Michel de Montaigne

There lies before us, if we choose, continual progress in happiness, knowledge, and wisdom. Shall we, instead, choose death, because we cannot forget our quarrels? We appeal as human beings to human beings: Remember your humanity, and forget the rest. If you can do so, the way lies open to a new Paradise; if you cannot, there lies before you the risk of universal death.

Bertrand Russell

Pleasure has its time; so, too, has wisdom. Make love in thy youth, and in old age, attend to thy salvation.