Famous Quotes & Sayings

Arthur Schopenhauer

There are two things which make it impossible to believe that this world is the successful work of an all-wise, all-good, and at the same time, all-powerful being; firstly, the misery which abounds in it everywhere; and secondly, the obvious imperfection of its highest product, man, who is a burlesque of what he should be.

Arthur Schopenhauer

It is a wise thing to be polite; consequently, it is a stupid thing to be rude. To make enemies by unnecessary and willful incivility, is just as insane a proceeding as to set your house on fire. For politeness is like a counter--an avowedly false coin, with which it is foolish to be stingy.

Arthur Schopenhauer

There is something in us that is wiser than our head.

Aristophanes

The wise learn many things from their enemies.

Antonio Machado

The deepest words of the wise man teach us the same as the whistle of the wind when it blows or the sound of the water when it is flowing.

Aphra Behn

I think a Play the best divertisement that wise men have: but I do also think them nothing so who do discourse so formallie about the rules of it, as if 'twere the grand affair of humane life.

Antonin Scalia

The wise do not investigate such silliness.

Bruce Lee

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

Edward Young

A dearth of words a woman need not fear; But 'tis a task indeed to learn to hear: In that the skill of conversation lies; That shows and makes you both polite and wise.

Edward Young

Be wise today; 'tis madness to defer. Next day the fatal precedent will plead; thus on, til wisdom is pushed our of life.

Edward Young

The bell strikes One. We take no note of time But from its loss. To give it then a tongue Is wise in man. As if an angel spoke, I feel the solemn sound. If heard aright, It is the knell of my departed hours.

Edward Young

Be wise to-day; 't is madness to defer.

Edward Young

The weak have remedies, the wise have joys; superior wisdom is superior bliss.

Edward Young

Titles are marks of honest men, and wise; The fool or knave that wears a title lies.

Edward Young

'T is greatly wise to talk with our past hours, And ask them what report they bore to heaven.

Edmund Morris

History admires the wise, but elevates the brave.

Edmund Spenser

For take thy ballaunce if thou be so wise, And weigh the winds that under heaven doth blow; Or weigh the light that in the east doth rise; Or weigh the thought that from man's mind doth flow.

Edmund Spenser

For deeds to die, however nobly done, And thoughts of men to as themselves decay, But wise words taught in numbers for to run, Recorded by the Muses, live for ay.

Edmund Spenser

What man so wise, what earthly wit so ware, As to descry the crafty cunning train, By which deceit doth mask in visor fair, And cast her colours dyed deep in grain, To seem like truth, whose shape she well can feign, And fitting gestures to her purpose frame, The guiltless man with guile to entertain?

Edmund Burke

Taxing is an easy business. Any projector can contrive new impositions; any bungler can add to the old; but is it altogether wise to have no other bounds to your impositions than the patience of those who are to bear them?

Edmund Burke

The wise determine from the gravity of the case; the irritable, from sensibility to oppression; the high minded, from disdain and indignation at abusive power in unworthy hands.

Edmund Burke

Thank God, men that art greatly guilty are never wise.

Edmund Burke

Wise men will apply their remedies to vices, not to names; to the causes of evil which are permanent, not the occasional organs by which they act, and the transitory modes in which they appear.

Edmund Burke

The individual is foolish; the multitude, for the moment is foolish, when they act without deliberation; but the species is wise, and, when time is given to it, as a species it always acts right.

Edmund Burke

The esteem of wise and good men is the greatest of all temporal encouragements to virtue; and it is a mark of an abandoned spirit to have no regard to it.

Edmund Burke

Oppression makes wise men mad; but the distemper is still the madness of the wise, which is better than the sobriety of fools.

Edmund Burke

Men are qualified for civil liberty in exact proportion to their disposition to put moral chains upon their own appetites…in proportion as they are more disposed to listen to the counsels of the wise and good, in preference to the flattery of knaves. Society cannot exist, unless a controlling power upon will and appetite be placed somewhere; and the less of it there is within, the more there must be without. It is ordained in the eternal constitution of things, that men of intemperate minds cannot be free. Their passions forge their fetters.

Bo Derek

It's been very nice. I haven't gotten out too much because we've been working a lot but other wise the people have been very nice and I've had a good time.

Bill Johnson

If you live cautiously, your friends will call you wise. You just won't move many mountains

Beverley Nichols

Life in the country teaches one that the really stimulating things are the quiet, natural things, and the really wearisome things are the noisy, unnatural things. It is more exciting to stand still than to dance. Silence is more eloquent than speech. Water is more stimulating than wine. Fresh air is more intoxicating than cigarette smoke. Sunlight is more subtle than electric light. The scent of grass is more luxurious than the most expensive perfume. The slow, simple observations of the peasant are more wise than the most sparkling epigrams of the latest wit.

Beverly Cleary

I had a very wise mother. She always kept books that were my grade level in our house.

Betty White

Now that I'm 91, as opposed to being 90, I'm much wiser. I'm much more aware and I'm much sexier.

Bernice Johnson Reagon

What would you be like if you had white hair and had not given up your principles? It might be wise as you deal with coalition efforts to think about the possibilities of going for fifty years.