Aphorisms Galore!

Wisdom and Ignorance

327 aphorisms  ·  10 comments

Aphorisms in This Category

tiny.ag/jwespnab  ·  submitted 1997

No affectation of peculiarity can conceal a commonplace mind.

W. Somerset Maugham, in Wisdom and Ignorance

tiny.ag/fkuqm4vt  ·  submitted 1997

She had a pretty gift for quotation, which is a serviceable substitute for wit.

W. Somerset Maugham, in Wisdom and Ignorance

tiny.ag/3zbbml0p  ·  submitted 1997

If you think education is expensive, try ignorance.

Andy McIntyre, in Wisdom and Ignorance

tiny.ag/dwmxy2kw  ·  submitted 1997

Education is civil defense against media fallout.

Marshall McLuhan, in Wisdom and Ignorance

tiny.ag/qol2sxws  ·  submitted 1997

The human mind treats a new idea the way the body treats a strange protein -- it rejects it.

Peter Medawar, in Wisdom and Ignorance

tiny.ag/kqr3auag  ·  submitted 1997

Any man who afflicts the human race with ideas must be prepared to see them misunderstood.

Henry Louis Mencken, in Wisdom and Ignorance

tiny.ag/h2rdoaxw  ·  submitted 1997

Wisdom sets bounds even to knowledge.

Friedrich Nietzsche, 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/pwxgqowu  ·  submitted 1997

We don't see things as they are. We see things as we are.

Anaïs Nin, in Wisdom and Ignorance

tiny.ag/l2qkzwis  ·  submitted 1997

Any man whose errors take ten years to correct is quite a man.

Robert J. Oppenheimer, (on Albert Einstein), 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

tiny.ag/pdln3czv  ·  submitted 1997

You can lead a horticulture but you can't make her think.

Dorothy Parker, (when asked to use the word "horticulture" in a sentence), in Wisdom and Ignorance

tiny.ag/hutuz2wq  ·  submitted 1997

The cure for boredom is curiosity. There is no cure for curiosity.

Ellen Parr, in Wisdom and Ignorance

tiny.ag/ctg0dc6w  ·  submitted 1999 by Bill Masterson

All generalizations are false, including this one.

Blaise Pascal, in Wisdom and Ignorance

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/sutptyxa  ·  submitted 1997

The only reason some people get lost in thought is because it's unfamiliar territory.

Paul Fix, in Wisdom and Ignorance

tiny.ag/chnlsua0  ·  submitted 1997

Education's purpose is to replace an empty mind with an open one.

Malcolm S. Forbes, in Wisdom and Ignorance