The Wise Quotes

The wise speak only of what they know

Fools call wise men fools. A wise man never calls any man a fool.

A wise man will desire no more than what he may get justly, use soberly, distribute cheerfully, and leave contently.

Deign on the passing world to turn thine eyes, And pause a while from learning to be wise. There mark what ills the scholar's life assail,- Toil, envy, want, the patron, and the jail.

If to be old is not to be wise, then it is simply to be obsolete.

Education does not necessarily make one wise?

Wise man was he who counselled that speculation should have free course, and look fearlessly towards all the thirty-two points of the compass, whithersoever and howsoever it listed.

To know is not to be wise. To know how to use knowledge is to have wisdom.

I was a bit of a Victorian Lady, fainting-wise.

A wise man fights to win, but he is twice a fool who has no plan for possible defeat.

I had grown up in a humanist atmosphere, and war to me was never anything but horror, mutilation and senseless destruction, and I knew that many great and wise people felt the same way about it.

To be smart, spend carefully. To be wise, save regularly. To be genius, give extravagantly.

The wise know too well their weakness to assume infallibility; and he who knows most knows best how little he knows.

Whosoever formeth an intimacy with the enemies of his friends, does so to injure the latter. O wise man! wash your hands of that friend who associates with your enemies.

I don't have the best family history heart-wise, so I really try to keep my heart strong.

He is wise who knows the sources of knowledge - where it is written and where it is to be found.

Loving God, help us remember the birth of Jesus, that we may share in the song of the angels, the gladness of the shepherds, and the worship of the wise men.

Learning makes the wise wiser and the fool more foolish.

Who can be wise, amazed, temperate and furious, Loyal and neutral, in a moment? No man.

At it's essence, art is an alchemical process. Alchemy is a process of transformation.

Some tools of thought are so blunt that they are almost useless; others are so sharp that they are dangerous. But the wise man will have the use of both kinds.

Children are the keys of Paradise. They alone are good and wise, because their thoughts, their very lives are prayer.

What is it to be wise? 'Tis but to know how little can be known, To see all others' faults, and feel our own.

How strange it is, that a fool or knave, with riches, should be treated with more respect by the world, than a good man, or a wise man in poverty!

You won't step on other's toes if you imagine yourself in their shoes.

Strike while the iron is hot.

Intellect annuls fate. So far as a man thinks he is free.

Wise men wrote the Constitution, but clever judges have been destroying it, bit by bit, turning it into an instrument of arbitrary judicial power, instead of a limitation on all government power.

There are subjects in which I wish to become knowledgeable, and subjects in which I wish to remain wise.

To endure oneself may be the hardest task in the universe. You cannot hire a wise man or any other intellect to solve it for you. There's no writ of inquest or calling of witness to provide answers.

If, presume not to God to scan; The proper study of Mankind is Man. Plac'd on this isthmus of a middle state, a being darkly wise, and rudely great.

There's a lot of people I've encouraged and helped to get into the House of Commons. Looking at them now, I'm not so sure it was a wise thing to do.

The prejudices of ignorance are more easily removed than the prejudices of interest; the first are blindly adopted; the second wilfully preferred.

I'd hate to see any film I'm involved in fail, especially artistically but also business-wise.

The wind cannot shake a mountain. Neither praise nor blame moves the wise man.

Ten thousand fools proclaim themselves into obscurity, while one wise man forgets himself into immortality.

Don't look where you fall, but where you slipped.

As a wise man once said, 'If not us, then who; if not now, then when?'

At times it is folly to hasten at other times, to delay. The wise do everything in its proper time.

Be not penny-wise. Riches have wings. Sometimes they fly away of themselves, and sometimes they must be set flying to bring in more.

An honest answer is the sign of true friendship.

Compromise makes a good umbrella, but a poor roof; it is temporary expedient, often wise in party politics, almost sure to be unwise in statesmanship.

People do not naturally become morally excellent or practically wise. They become so, if at all, only as the result of lifelong personal and community effort.

The wise do not investigate such silliness.

Folly pursues us at all periods of our lives. If someone seems wise it is only because his follies are proportionate to his age and fortune.

A wise man seeks much counsel...a fool listens to all of it.

There is nothing the wise man does reluctantly.

Wealth is the slave of a wise man. The master of a fool.

Friendship of the wise is good; a wise enemy is better than a foolish friend.

To die is poignantly bitter, but the idea of having to die without having lived is unbearable.