Quotations

“Only one who despises happiness will attain knowledge.”

Original: Nur wer das Glück verachtet, wird Erkenntnis erlangen. — Highlights the grim link between suffering and insight in his worldview · Notebook fragment, c. 1910 (German)

Georg Trakl

“Doubt is the beginning of wisdom, but trust is its fulfillment.”

Original: Tvilen er visdommens begynnelse, men tilliten er dens fullbyrdelse. — Balances healthy skepticism with the necessity of ultimate trust · Philosophical notes (Norwegian)

Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson

“You are on your way to become a poet, and will, by and by, learn how much strength as well as beauty lies in repose.”

On restraint as a mark of poetic maturity · Letter to Cincinnatus Hiner (Joaquin) Miller, August 19, 1869

Bret Harte

“Politeness is not always a sign of wisdom; but the want of it always leaves room for a suspicion of folly, if folly and imprudence are the same.”

Politeness as a marker of prudence · Conversation / essay (as commonly attributed)

Walter Savage Landor

“Nothing shows a lack of philosophy and wisdom more than wanting the whole of life to be wise and philosophical.”

Original: Nessun maggior segno d'essere poco filosofo e poco savio, che volere savia e filosofica tutta la vita. — A witty warning against allowing reflection and seriousness to crowd ordinary life out altogether. · Pensieri, XXVII, published posthumously in 1845 (Italian)

Giacomo Leopardi

“When anyone, as I am now doing, approaches the age of seventy-four, he ought to be able to tell his juniors something worth listening to.”

A wry reflection on age, experience, and the obligation to pass something worthwhile to younger generations · Reminiscences and Opinions, Chapter I

Francis Hastings Doyle

“The best riches of the earth are produced on its surface, and we need no reasoning to teach us the folly of a people who should leave its harvest ungathered to dig for its ores.”

A metaphor for recognising wisdom that lies plainly before us · Lecture, On the Nature of Poetry, 1825–26

William Cullen Bryant

“It is the mark of the wise to change their minds, of human beings to be mistaken, and of honest people to admit it.”

Original: De sabios es mudar de consejo, de hombres el equivocarse, de honrados reconocerlo. — Defending the willingness to change one's mind and admit error · Preface, La guerra literaria (Spanish)

Manuel Machado

“If I have written well, let it be consider'd that 'tis what no man can do without good sense, a quality that not only renders one capable of being a good writer, but a good man.”

Connecting literary judgement with judgement in life · Preface to The Works of Alexander Pope, 1717

Alexander Pope

“It is and it must in the long run be better for a man to see things as they are than to be ignorant of them.”

Choosing difficult truth over comfortable ignorance · Introductory Lecture, University College London, 1892

A.E.Housman

“Entire happiness is not attainable either by this or by any other method.”

Rejecting promises that any single pursuit can provide complete happiness · Introductory Lecture, University College London, 1892

A.E.Housman

“People are too prone to torment themselves with devising far-fetched reasons.”

Preferring straightforward explanations to elaborate intellectual justifications · Introductory Lecture, University College London, 1892

A.E.Housman

“Existence is not itself a good thing, that we should spend a lifetime securing its necessaries.”

Distinguishing the preservation of life from the purposes that make life worthwhile · Introductory Lecture, University College London, 1892

A.E.Housman

“The less one says about a subject which one does not understand, the less one will say about it which is foolish.”

A compact argument for intellectual restraint · Lecture, The Application of Thought to Textual Criticism, 1921

A.E.Housman

“Of course you can have hard-and-fast rules if you like, but then you will have false rules, and they will lead you wrong.”

Warning against simple rules imposed upon complicated human problems · Lecture, The Application of Thought to Textual Criticism, 1921

A.E.Housman

“Whatever is pleasant is good, unless it can be shewn that in the long run it is harmful.”

A concise statement of Housman's argument about pleasure and value · Introductory Lecture, University College London, 1892

A.E.Housman

“Absolute security for existence is unattainable, and no wise man will pursue it.”

Arguing that excessive concern for safety prevents genuine living · Introductory Lecture, University College London, 1892

A.E.Housman

“The house of delusions is cheap to build, but draughty to live in, and ready at any instant to fall.”

A characteristically dry warning against comforting falsehoods · Introductory Lecture, University College London, 1892

A.E.Housman

“If you can not be seduced by beauty, you cannot learn the wisdom of ugliness.”

Arguing that an understanding of ugliness depends upon responsiveness to beauty · Essay, Notes on Thought and Vision

Hilda Doolittle

“Aim of men and women of highest development is equilibrium, balance, growth of the three at once.”

Defining fulfilment as the balanced development of body, mind and visionary awareness · Essay, Notes on Thought and Vision

Hilda Doolittle

“Meanwhile the years were coming over me with their wisdom, and I began to realise that men cannot live by dreams.”

A rueful recognition of the claims of practical life · Autobiographical letter to Lewis Chase, 6 June 1917

Francis Ledwidge

“What we call Life is a condition of the soul, and the soul must improve in happiness and wisdom, except by its own fault.”

Presenting life as an inward process of moral and emotional growth · Letter to Robert Browning, 5 March 1845

Elizabeth Barrett Browning

“I am not desponding by nature, and after a course of bitter mental discipline and long bodily seclusion, I come out with two learnt lessons—the wisdom of cheerfulness—and the duty of social intercourse.”

Drawing lessons of cheerfulness and human connection from prolonged adversity · Letter to Robert Browning, 5 March 1845

Elizabeth Barrett Browning

“Only those are worthy of love who carry within themselves the reason for being loved.”

Original: Ибо те одни достойны быть любимы, которые в себе самих заключают причину, побуждающую их любить. — Affection, in this view, should arise from qualities genuinely present in the person loved. · Essay “On Friendship”, 1792 (Russian)

Ivan Krylov

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Topic: Wisdom