Philosophy on wisdom

“Wise men speak because they have something to say; fools because they have to say something.”

“He who learns but does not think is lost. He who thinks but does not learn is in great danger.”

“Science is organized knowledge. Wisdom is organized life.”

“Common sense is not so common.”

“Judge a man by his questions rather than by his answers.”

“That which is desirable on its own account and for the sake of knowing it is more of the nature of wisdom than that which is desirable on account of its results.”

“The truly good and wise man will bear all kinds of fortune in a seemly way, and will always act in the noblest manner that the circumstances allow.”

“The rules of logic are to mathematics what those of structure are to architecture.”

“Mathematics takes us still further from what is human, into the region of absolute necessity, to which not only the world, but every possible world, must conform.”

“When people begin to philosophize they seem to think it necessary to make themselves artificially stupid.”

“Every philosophical problem, when it is subjected to the necessary analysis and justification, is found either to be not really philosophical at all, or else to be, in the sense in which we are using the word, logical.”

“Political ideals must be based upon ideals for the individual life. The aim of politics should be to make the lives of individuals as good as possible.”

“Indeed, wisdom is born of meditation; without meditation wisdom is lost. Knowing this twofold path of gain and loss of wisdom, one should conduct oneself so that wisdom may increase.”

“The food of the wise, Mahāmati, is what is eaten by the Rishis; it does not consist of meat and blood.”

“If you have wisdom, you will be without greed or attachment. Always examine yourselves, and do not allow yourselves to have faults, for it is in this way that you will be able to obtain liberation within my Dharma.”

“You should increasingly benefit yourselves by acquiring hearing, contemplating , and cultivating wisdom. Even though a person only has flesh eyes, if he has illuminating wisdom, he has clear understanding.”

“Let my skin and sinews and bones dry up, together with all the flesh and blood of my body! I welcome it! But I will not move from this spot until I have attained the supreme and final wisdom.”

“If one does not understand a person, one tends to regard him as a fool.”

“Man has three ways of acting wisely. First, on meditation; that is the noblest. Secondly, on imitation; that is the easiest. Thirdly, on experience; that is the bitterest.”

“By extensively studying all learning, and keeping himself under the restraint of the rules of propriety, one may thus likewise not err from what is right.”

“The superior man accords with the course of the Mean. Though he may be all unknown, unregarded by the world, he feels no regret — It is only the sage who is able for this.”

“Virtuous, worthy, wise and capable people are chosen as leaders.”

“I now myself live, in every detail, striving for wisdom, while I formerly merely worshipped and idolized the wise.”

“Only fool! Only poet! / Merely speaking colorfully, / From fools' masks shouting colorfully, / Climbing about on deceptive word-bridges, / On misleading rainbows, / Between false heavens / Rambling, lurking —Only fool! Only poet!”

“Who looks in the sun will see no light else; but also he will see no shadow. Our life revolves unceasingly, but the centre is ever the same, and the wise will regard only the seasons of the soul.”

“Any fool can make a rule / And every fool will mind it.”

“Lawyers are the only persons in whom ignorance of the law is not punished.”

“Sophistry is only fit to make men more conceited in their ignorance.”

“He that knows anything, knows this, in the first place, that he need not seek long for instances of his ignorance.”

“Laotse packs his oracular wisdom into five thousand words of concentrated brilliance. No thinker ever wrote fewer words to embody a whole philosophy and had as much influence upon the thought of a nation.”

“Whoever speaks is not wise, whoever is wise always keep silence; I hear this message from Laozi. If Laozi is a wise man, why did he himself write Dao De Jing which has five thousand words?”

“Our sages have taught us to learn one thing; `As in the Self, so in the Universe.' It is not possible to scan the universe as it is to scan the self. Know the self and you know the universe.”

“Let no act be done at haphazard, nor otherwise than according to the finished rules that govern its kind.”

“Let your occupations be few, says the sage, if you would lead a tranquil life.”

“Search men's governing principles, and consider the wise, what they shun and what they cleave to.”

“Parmenides: It is impossible to conceive of many without one.”

“Parmenides: Just as things in a picture, when viewed from a distance, appear to be all in one and the same condition and alike.”

“The beginning in every task is the chief thing.”

“Socrates: The shoemaker, for example, uses a square tool, and a circular tool, and other tools for cutting?”

“Of course, he who has put forth his total strength in fit actions, has the richest return of wisdom.”

“I only wish that wisdom were the kind of thing that flowed ... from the vessel that was full to the one that was empty.”

“Each of these private teachers who work for pay ... inculcates nothing else than these opinions of the multitude which they opine when they are assembled and calls this knowledge wisdom.”

“The question is asked in ignorance, by one who does not even know what can have led him to ask it.”

“The source of every Crime, is some defect of the Understanding; or some error in Reasoning, or some sudden force of the Passions. Defect in the Understanding, is Ignorance; in Reasoning, Erroneous Opinion.”

“Fools admire everything in an author of reputation.”