Where there is shouting, there is no true knowledge.

If I get stuck, I look at a book that tells me how someone else did it. I turn the pages, and then I say, ‚Oh, I forgot that bit,‘ then close the book and carry on. Finally, after you’ve figured out how to do it, you read how they did it and find out how dumb your solution is and how much more clever and efficient theirs is!

I have made the mistaken assumption – and I will attempt to be better at this – of thinking that because somebody is on Twitter and is attacking me that it is open season. And that is my mistake.

Speech is human, silence is divine, yet also brutish and dead: therefore we must learn both arts.

I’m going to save my public voice largely for the issues where I have some depth.

We have but one permanent home: heaven – that’s still the old truth that we always have to re-learn – and it’s only through the impact of sad experiences that we assimilate it.

Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested.

The degree of one’s emotions varies inversely with one’s knowledge of the facts.

If I’ve got a problem with one of my clients that needs to get solved, guess what I’m going to do? I’m going to call them up, and I’m going to say, ‚Hey, here’s what’s going on. This is the situation. This thing went sideways. I didn’t expect it. Now it’s going to take me some more time to get you what you need.‘ But I’m going to do that upfront.

When I talked to him on the phone yesterday. I called him George rather than Mr. Vice President. But, in public, it’s Mr. Vice President, because that is who he is.

All men hate the nagging.

There are some people, you know, they think the way to be a big man is to shout and stomp and raise hell-and then nothing ever really happens. I’m not like that I never shoot blanks.

Although nature commences with reason and ends in experience it is necessary for us to do the opposite, that is to commence with experience and from this to proceed to investigate the reason.

A wise man can learn more from a foolish question than a fool can learn from a wise answer.

Truthful words are not beautiful; beautiful words are not truthful. Good words are not persuasive; persuasive words are not good.

I have hardly ever known a mathematician who was capable of reasoning.

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.

At seventy-seven it is time to be in earnest.

My wife and I tried two or three times in the last 40 years to have breakfast together, but it was so disagreeable we had to stop.

For, if a good speaker, never so eloquent, does not see into the fact, and is not speaking the truth of that – is there a more horrid kind of object in creation?

Understanding is a two-way street.

Anger dwells only in the bosom of fools.

Talk to a man about himself and he will listen for hours.

Ignorance is preferable to error, and he is less remote from the truth who believes nothing than he who believes what is wrong.

A man may imagine things that are false, but he can only understand things that are true, for if the things be false, the apprehension of them is not understanding.

To keep your secret is wisdom; but to expect others to keep it is folly.

True friendship can afford true knowledge. It does not depend on darkness and ignorance.

Self-pity is our worst enemy and if we yield to it, we can never do anything wise in this world.

We think when God speaks to us, there’s going to be a boom out of Heaven or we’re going to get some chill bumps, but I really believe God’s talking to us all the time. He’s talking to us right in here. I call it our heart, our conscience, but it’s the Holy Spirit talking to us.

Every step of life shows much caution is required.

I think everyone should approach relationships from the perspective of playing it straight and giving someone the benefit of the doubt. Until he establishes that this is a game. And if it’s a game, you need to win. The best thing to do is just walk away from the table.

As commanders and staff officers, we are coaches and sentries for our units: how can we coach anything if we don’t know a hell of a lot more than just the TTPs?

Every legend, moreover, contains its residuum of truth, and the root function of language is to control the universe by describing it.

Thought must be divided against itself before it can come to any knowledge of itself.

Is there anyone so wise as to learn by the experience of others?

There are worse crimes than burning books. One of them is not reading them.

Truth is mysterious, elusive, always to be conquered. Liberty is dangerous, as hard to live with as it is elating. We must march toward these two goals, painfully but resolutely, certain in advance of our failings on so long a road.

People have to talk about something just to keep their voice boxes in working order so they’ll have good voice boxes in case there’s ever anything really meaningful to say.

Blessed is the man who expects nothing, for he shall never be disappointed was the ninth beatitude.

The only real security that a man can have in this world is a reserve of knowledge, experience and ability.

There is some self-interest behind every friendship. There is no friendship without self-interests. This is a bitter truth.

He who knows nothing is closer to the truth than he whose mind is filled with falsehoods and errors.

He who despairs of the human condition is a coward, but he who has hope for it is a fool.

An optimist is a person who sees a green light everywhere, while a pessimist sees only the red stoplight… the truly wise person is colorblind.

All our words from loose using have lost their edge.

Though I do manage to mumble around in about seven or eight languages, English remains the most beautiful of languages. It will do anything.

Clean fighting solves everything. It ends all bad blood and any ill feelings people have. That’s my thoughts.

The lie is a condition of life.

In a certain way, it’s the sound of the words, the inflection and the way the song is sung and the way it fits the melody and the way the syllables are on the tongue that has as much of the meaning as the actual, literal words.

There are many times when a woman will ask another girl friend how she likes her new hat. She will reply, ‚Fine,‘ but slap her hand to her forehead the minute the girl leaves to yipe, ‚What a horror!‘

I’m married. My wife, Stella – a beautiful woman. She’s brought a lot of peace to my life, a lot of wisdom.

If to do were as easy as to know what were good to do, chapels had been churches, and poor men’s cottage princes‘ palaces.

My education was the liberty I had to read indiscriminately and all the time, with my eyes hanging out.

It is the supreme art of the teacher to awaken joy in creative expression and knowledge.

I’m terrified of losing my voice.

In true dialogue, both sides are willing to change.

All this worldly wisdom was once the unamiable heresy of some wise man.

The career of a sage is of two kinds: He is either honored by all in the world, Like a flower waving its head, Or else he disappears into the silent forest.

Truth is what works.

Man is always looking for someone to boast to; woman is always looking for a shoulder to put her head on.

Each piece, or part, of the whole of nature is always merely an approximation to the complete truth, or the complete truth so far as we know it. In fact, everything we know is only some kind of approximation because we know that we do not know all the laws as yet.