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

An intelligent man is sometimes forced to be drunk to spend time with his fools.

An investment in knowledge pays the best interest.

True wisdom comes to each of us when we realize how little we understand about life, ourselves, and the world around us.

You can be young without money but you can’t be old without it.

I prefer tongue-tied knowledge to ignorant loquacity.

Experience teaches us that it is much easier to prevent an enemy from posting themselves than it is to dislodge them after they have got possession.

It isn’t what we don’t know that gives us trouble, it’s what we know that ain’t so.

If I had only one sermon to preach it would be a sermon against pride.

The instruction we find in books is like fire. We fetch it from our neighbours, kindle it at home, communicate it to others, and it becomes the property of all.

I’ve had some ‚riotous excursions of the human spirit‘ alongside the young Sailors and Marines, and it’s time to leave the stage to the young leaders who got their rank the old-fashioned way – they earned their stripes in combat.

In George Bush you get experience, and with me you get – The Future!

Young men soon give, and soon forget, affronts; old age is slow in both.

It is always wise to look ahead, but difficult to look further than you can see.

It is easy to hate and it is difficult to love. This is how the whole scheme of things works. All good things are difficult to achieve; and bad things are very easy to get.

After many years of great mercy, after tasting of the powers of the world to come, we still are so weak, so foolish; but, oh! when we get away from self to God, there all is truth and purity and holiness, and our heart finds peace, wisdom, completeness, delight, joy, victory.

We are braver and wiser because they existed, those strong women and strong men… We are who we are because they were who they were. It’s wise to know where you come from, who called your name.

To conquer fear is the beginning of wisdom.

People who know little are usually great talkers, while men who know much say little.

Excellence encourages one about life generally; it shows the spiritual wealth of the world.

If an elderly but distinguished scientist says that something is possible, he is almost certainly right; but if he says that it is impossible, he is very probably wrong.

I once did a three-hour interview with Radio Oxford only to be told the microphone hadn’t picked me up.

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

Books are as useful to a stupid person as a mirror is useful to a blind person.

Beware of the man who works hard to learn something, learns it, and finds himself no wiser than before.

The sage does not hoard. The more he helps others, the more he benefits himself, The more he gives to others, the more he gets himself. The Way of Heaven does one good but never does one harm. The Way of the sage is to act but not to compete.

Experience is not what happens to you; it’s what you do with what happens to you.

Let us with caution indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion. Reason and experience both forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle.

The experience of God, or in any case the possibility of experiencing God, is innate.

That men do not learn very much from the lessons of history is the most important of all the lessons of history.

The true sign of intelligence is not knowledge but imagination.

When you have shot one bird flying you have shot all birds flying. They are all different and they fly in different ways but the sensation is the same and the last one is as good as the first.

Theories are always very thin and insubstantial, experience only is tangible.

I am an old man and have known a great many troubles, but most of them never happened.

I consider wisdom supernatural because it isn’t taught by men – it’s a gift from God.

The farther backward you can look, the farther forward you can see.

The real truths of life are never entirely new to you or to anybody because there is a level deep down within you where you already know all the things, all those spiritual truths that you read or hear, and then recognize them. I say ‚recognize‘ because you’re not… it’s not new.

Remember you are just an extra in everyone else’s play.

Here is the rule to remember in the future, When anything tempts you to be bitter: not, ‚This is a misfortune‘ but ‚To bear this worthily is good fortune.‘

Virtue is like a rich stone, best plain set.

The older I get the more wisdom I find in the ancient rule of taking first things first. A process which often reduces the most complex human problem to a manageable proportion.

Going to Southeast Asia for the first time and tasting that spectrum of flavors – that certainly changed my whole palate, the kind of foods I crave. A lot of the dishes I used to love became boring to me.

Those whom the gods love grow young.

One can survive everything, nowadays, except death, and live down everything except a good reputation.

Great minds are related to the brief span of time during which they live as great buildings are to a little square in which they stand: you cannot see them in all their magnitude because you are standing too close to them.

It is the heart always that sees, before the head can see.

My mother said I must always be intolerant of ignorance but understanding of illiteracy. That some people, unable to go to school, were more educated and more intelligent than college professors.

Truth has no special time of its own. Its hour is now – always.

A man who suffers before it is necessary, suffers more than is necessary.

All life is an experiment. The more experiments you make the better.

The utmost extent of man’s knowledge, is to know that he knows nothing.

Every secret of a writer’s soul, every experience of his life, every quality of his mind is written large in his works.

Happiness is a hard master, particularly other people’s happiness.

Some minds remain open long enough for the truth not only to enter but to pass on through by way of a ready exit without pausing anywhere along the route.

Who has fully realized that history is not contained in thick books but lives in our very blood?

Sincere words are not fine; fine words are not sincere.

A man must be big enough to admit his mistakes, smart enough to profit from them, and strong enough to correct them.

The hidden harmony is better than the obvious.

An eye for an eye only ends up making the whole world blind.

The truth. It is a beautiful and terrible thing, and must therefore be treated with great caution.

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