Aphorisms Galore!

Wisdom and Ignorance

327 aphorisms  ·  10 comments

Aphorisms in This Category

tiny.ag/jjws8glu  ·  submitted 1997

The wise through excess of wisdom is made a fool.

Ralph Waldo Emerson, in Wisdom and Ignorance

tiny.ag/jcg8ibwt  ·  submitted 1997

Sometimes a scream is better than a thesis.

Ralph Waldo Emerson, in Wisdom and Ignorance

tiny.ag/8hodlqqe  ·  submitted 1997

People seem not to see that their opinion of the world is also a confessor of character.

Ralph Waldo Emerson, in Wisdom and Ignorance

tiny.ag/7andkqlu  ·  submitted 1997

People only see what they are prepared to see.

Ralph Waldo Emerson, in Wisdom and Ignorance

tiny.ag/qn3ryz0y  ·  submitted 1998

Freedom is not the right to live as we please, but the right to find how we ought to live in order to fulfill our potential.

Ralph Waldo Emerson, in Wisdom and Ignorance

tiny.ag/yoharucr  ·  submitted 1997

Every man I meet is in some way my superior.

Ralph Waldo Emerson, in Wisdom and Ignorance

tiny.ag/7fjtgxm8  ·  submitted 1997

The two most common elements in the universe are hydrogen and stupidity.

Harlan Ellison, in Wisdom and Ignorance

tiny.ag/jagw9uxy  ·  submitted 1997

It is time I stepped aside for a less experienced and less able man.

Scott Elledge, (on his retirement from Cornell University), in Wisdom and Ignorance and Work and Recreation

tiny.ag/sefftpkt  ·  submitted 1997

Horse sense is the thing a horse has which keeps it from betting on people.

W. C. Fields, in Wisdom and Ignorance

tiny.ag/y0inete4  ·  submitted 1997

Education is the process of driving a set of prejudices down your throat.

Martin H. Fischer, in Wisdom and Ignorance

tiny.ag/cxkiivxs  ·  submitted 1997

The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time, and still retain the ability to function.

F. Scott Fitzgerald, in Science and Religion and Wisdom and Ignorance

tiny.ag/y7qkjsrf  ·  submitted 1997

Uncertainty and mystery are energies of life. Don't let them scare you unduly, for they keep boredom at bay and spark creativity.

R. I. Fitzhenry, in Wisdom and Ignorance

tiny.ag/z91tc0go  ·  submitted 1997

It's better to keep your mouth shut and give the impression that you're stupid than to open it and remove all doubt.

Unknown, in Wisdom and Ignorance

tiny.ag/mchnry1s  ·  submitted 1997

A great deal of intelligence can be invested in ignorance when the need for illusion is deep.

Saul Bellow, in Wisdom and Ignorance

tiny.ag/mfx0o8sc  ·  submitted 1997

If what Proust says is true, that happiness is the absence of fever, then I will never know happiness. For I am possessed by a fever for knowledge, experience, and creation.

Anaïs Nin, in Happiness and Misery and Wisdom and Ignorance

tiny.ag/ipa5yree  ·  submitted 1997

No man's knowledge here can go beyond his experience.

John A. Locke, An Essay Concerning Human Understanding (1689), in Wisdom and Ignorance

tiny.ag/wuzygxbp  ·  submitted 1999

Watch the traffic, the light will never hit you.

"Moms" Mabley, in Wisdom and Ignorance

tiny.ag/qkrsbfxv  ·  submitted 1997

The person who knows how to laugh at himself will never cease to be amused.

Shirley Maclaine, in Wisdom and Ignorance

tiny.ag/8egicznw  ·  submitted 1997

You have to be an intellectual to believe such nonsense. No ordinary man could be such a fool.

George Orwell, in Wisdom and Ignorance