Just as treasures are uncovered from the earth, so virtue appears from good deeds, and wisdom appears from a pure and peaceful mind. To walk safely through the maze of human life, one needs the light of wisdom and the guidance of virtue.

As a blind man has no idea of colors, so have we no idea of the manner by which the all-wise God perceives and understands all things.

When you know a thing, to hold that you know it, and when you do not know a thing, to allow that you do not know it – this is knowledge.

You can always tell an old soldier by the inside of his holsters and cartridge boxes. The young ones carry pistols and cartridges; the old ones, grub.

Wisdom stands at the turn in the road and calls upon us publicly, but we consider it false and despise its adherents.

Error is always more busy than truth.

Conscience is a man’s compass.

Truth is the most valuable thing we have. Let us economize it.

Moral authority is never retained by any attempt to hold on to it. It comes without seeking and is retained without effort.

Man is the most intelligent of the animals – and the most silly.

Words may show a man’s wit but actions his meaning.

The teacher who is indeed wise does not bid you to enter the house of his wisdom but rather leads you to the threshold of your mind.

Poets utter great and wise things which they do not themselves understand.

My old drama coach used to say, ‚Don’t just do something, stand there.‘ Gary Cooper wasn’t afraid to do nothing.

I don’t see the wisdom in modern politicians that I once saw in men like Dean Acheson, David Bruce, or George Marshall. In my day, the northeastern establishment dominated foreign policy formulation, but the composition and distribution of our population is very different today.

The last suit that you wear, you don’t need any pockets.

At eighteen our convictions are hills from which we look; at forty-five they are caves in which we hide.

Men must be taught as if you taught them not, and things unknown proposed as things forgot.

Treat those who are good with goodness, and also treat those who are not good with goodness. Thus goodness is attained. Be honest to those who are honest, and be also honest to those who are not honest. Thus honesty is attained.

Good judgment comes from experience, and a lot of that comes from bad judgment.

For most of us, wisdom is acquired in the thicket of experience and usually meets us somewhere along the way if we live long enough. But sooner is better than later.

To know yet to think that one does not know is best; Not to know yet to think that one knows will lead to difficulty.

A just and reasonable modesty does not only recommend eloquence, but sets off every great talent which a man can be possessed of.

There is a difference between happiness and wisdom: he that thinks himself the happiest man is really so; but he that thinks himself the wisest is generally the greatest fool.

To suppose that any form of government will secure liberty or happiness without any virtue in the people, is a chimerical idea.

The most interesting information comes from children, for they tell all they know and then stop.

My musical taste and image is going to change naturally. It’s not forced; I do what comes natural to me. Sometimes, I like to be dark… other times, I like to be really light and ladylike.

He who knows others is wise. He who knows himself is enlightened.

Education is an admirable thing, but it is well to remember from time to time that nothing that is worth knowing can be taught.

As you get older, time speeds up but life slows down.

It seems the older you get, the more life comes into focus.

No greater thing is created suddenly, any more than a bunch of grapes or a fig. If you tell me that you desire a fig, I answer you that there must be time. Let it first blossom, then bear fruit, then ripen.

We dance round in a ring and suppose, but the secret sits in the middle and knows.

I say, beware of all enterprises that require new clothes, and not rather a new wearer of clothes.

I’m convinced of this: Good done anywhere is good done everywhere. For a change, start by speaking to people rather than walking by them like they’re stones that don’t matter. As long as you’re breathing, it’s never too late to do some good.

Knowledge of what is does not open the door directly to what should be.

I’d rather learn from one bird how to sing than teach 10,000 stars how not to dance.

One whose knowledge is confined to books and whose wealth is in the possession of others, can use neither his knowledge nor wealth when the need for them arises.

To reform a world, to reform a nation, no wise man will undertake; and all but foolish men know, that the only solid, though a far slower reformation, is what each begins and perfects on himself.

Unless we form the habit of going to the Bible in bright moments as well as in trouble, we cannot fully respond to its consolations because we lack equilibrium between light and darkness.

A life spent making mistakes is not only more honorable, but more useful than a life spent doing nothing.

Let us not listen to those who think we ought to be angry with our enemies, and who believe this to be great and manly. Nothing is so praiseworthy, nothing so clearly shows a great and noble soul, as clemency and readiness to forgive.

The ideas gained by men before they are twenty-five are practically the only ideas they shall have in their lives.

Necessity dispenseth with decorum.

When one has finished building one’s house, one suddenly realizes that in the process one has learned something that one really needed to know in the worst way – before one began.

Though ambition in itself is a vice, it often is also the parent of virtue.

The two powers which in my opinion constitute a wise man are those of bearing and forbearing.

Leave it as it is. The ages have been at work on it and man can only mar it.

Knowledge becomes evil if the aim be not virtuous.

To suffer the penalty of too much haste, which is too little speed.

Life levels all men. Death reveals the eminent.

Where there is reverence there is fear, but there is not reverence everywhere that there is fear, because fear presumably has a wider extension than reverence.

It is not when truth is dirty, but when it is shallow, that the lover of knowledge is reluctant to step into its waters.

Courage is not simply one of the virtues, but the form of every virtue at the testing point.

There are only two things. Truth and lies. Truth is indivisible, hence it cannot recognize itself; anyone who wants to recognize it has to be a lie.

The truth of things is the chief nutriment of superior intellects.

Everywhere the human soul stands between a hemisphere of light and another of darkness; on the confines of the two everlasting empires, necessity and free will.

Truth is the beginning of every good to the gods, and of every good to man.

Perplexity is the beginning of knowledge.

What most persons consider as virtue, after the age of 40 is simply a loss of energy.

He who is not just is severe, he who is not wise is sad.