Of all the many leaders I have met in the course of my life, none made a deeper impression on me than Nelson Mandela. His courage, compassion, humility and wisdom were without parallel on the world stage, and he himself was an enduring source of inspiration.
All human wisdom is summed up in two words; wait and hope.
I am not one who was born in the custody of wisdom; I am one who is fond of olden times and intense in quest of the sacred knowing of the ancients.
The seven wise men of Greece, so famous for their wisdom all the world over, acquired all that fame, each of them, by a single sentence consisting of two or three words.
Look twice before you leap.
Now that I am sixty, I see why the idea of elder wisdom has passed from currency.
Let my skin and sinews and bones dry up, together with all the flesh and blood of my body! I welcome it! But I will not move from this spot until I have attained the supreme and final wisdom.
It is while you are patiently toiling at the little tasks of life that the meaning and shape of the great whole of life dawn on you.
The man who makes everything that leads to happiness depends upon himself, and not upon other men, has adopted the very best plan for living happily. This is the man of moderation, the man of manly character and of wisdom.
It is not wisdom but Authority that makes a law.
Who is wise in love, love most, say least.
I am a poor student sitting at the feet of giants, yearning for their wisdom and begging for lessons that might one day make me a complete artist, so that if all goes well, I may one day sit beside them.
A man of strength and wisdom, John Paul became an inspiration to generations of both Catholics and non-Catholics throughout the world by encouraging freedom, promoting peace and respecting all faiths.
When you doubt, abstain.
What we call wisdom is the result of all the wisdom of past ages. Our best institutions are like young trees growing upon the roots of the old trunks that have crumbled away.
Moderation is the inseparable companion of wisdom, but with it genius has not even a nodding acquaintance.
Make it your habit not to be critical about small things.
To acquire knowledge, one must study; but to acquire wisdom, one must observe.
The greatest wisdom is to realize one’s lack of it.
Wisdom ceases to be wisdom when it becomes too proud to weep, too grave to laugh, and too selfish to seek other than itself.
The greater our knowledge increases the more our ignorance unfolds.
It may almost be a question whether such wisdom as many of us have in our mature years has not come from the dying out of the power of temptation, rather than as the results of thought and resolution.
Second, this epic tale allows the audience to actually listen to the Native Americans and receive their wisdom. Spielberg conveys the respect for Native Americans that is normally lacking in Western films.
An owl is traditionally a symbol of wisdom, so we are neither doves nor hawks but owls, and we are vigilant when others are resting.
To wear your heart on your sleeve isn’t a very good plan; you should wear it inside, where it functions best.
Perspective is worth 80 IQ points.
Ignorant men raise questions that wise men answered a thousand years ago.
You need to have extraordinary wisdom to be the forerunner.
There are three faithful friends – an old wife, an old dog, and ready money.
In life, all good things come hard, but wisdom is the hardest to come by.
The less you talk, the more you’re listened to.
There is this difference between happiness and wisdom: he that thinks himself the happiest man, really is so; but he that thinks himself the wisest, is generally the greatest fool.
Wisdom is knowing what to do next; virtue is doing it.
Those who govern, having much business on their hands, do not generally like to take the trouble of considering and carrying into execution new projects. The best public measures are therefore seldom adopted from previous wisdom, but forced by the occasion.
However, I must not indulge in homespun wisdom here before so distinguished an assembly, especially as I am to be followed by a representative of science.
Without freedom of thought, there can be no such thing as wisdom – and no such thing as public liberty without freedom of speech.
Sorrow is knowledge, those that know the most must mourn the deepest, the tree of knowledge is not the tree of life.
The ultimate wisdom which deals with beginnings, remains locked in a seed. There it lies, the simplest fact of the universe and at the same time the one which calls faith rather than reason.
Raising children is an incredibly hard and risky business in which no cumulative wisdom is gained: each generation repeats the mistakes the previous one made.
Never give up, which is the lesson I learned from boxing. As soon as you learn to never give up, you have to learn the power and wisdom of unconditional surrender, and that one doesn’t cancel out the other; they just exist as contradictions. The wisdom of it comes as you get older.
Novels are the Socratic dialogues of our time. Practical wisdom fled from school wisdom into this liberal form.
Our experience is composed rather of illusions lost than of wisdom acquired.
This, and this alone, is Christianity, a universal holiness in every part of life, a heavenly wisdom in all our actions, not conforming to the spirit and temper of the world but turning all worldly enjoyments into means of piety and devotion to God.
The wisdom of the wise is an uncommon degree of common sense.
Before we acquire great power we must acquire wisdom to use it well.
Wisdom begins at the end.
I’ve always shied away from conventional wisdom, though I know the power of it.
To keep your secret is wisdom; to expect others to keep it is folly.
The final wisdom of life requires not the annulment of incongruity but the achievement of serenity within and above it.
Wisdom has its root in goodness, not goodness its root in wisdom.
A great memory is never made synonymous with wisdom, any more than a dictionary would be called a treatise.
When a thing is done, it’s done. Don’t look back. Look forward to your next objective.
Wisdom denotes the pursuing of the best ends by the best means.
You can’t sweep other people off their feet, if you can’t be swept off your own.
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.
I have authentic wisdom to share with others.
However great an evil immorality may be, we must not forget that it is not without its beneficial consequences. It is only through extremes that men can arrive at the middle path of wisdom and virtue.
Keep me away from the wisdom which does not cry, the philosophy which does not laugh and the greatness which does not bow before children.
It is better to risk starving to death then surrender. If you give up on your dreams, what’s left?
As you mature and gain a semblance of wisdom and a sense of what life is all about… this is by no means true of everyone, but a lot of actors like to escape themselves. Inhabiting another person’s persona is often a good way of escaping yourself.
Wisdom is not wisdom when it is derived from books alone.
Knowledge shrinks as wisdom grows.
Wisdom and goodness are twin-born, one heart must hold both sisters, never seen apart.
Slow and steady wins the race.
No man was ever wise by chance.
Good men by nature, wish to know. I know that many will call this useless work… men who desire nothing but material riches and are absolutely devoid of that of wisdom, which is the food and only true riches of the mind.
To conquer fear is the beginning of wisdom.
Women are stronger than men – they do not die of wisdom.
It takes a great man to give sound advice tactfully, but a greater to accept it graciously.
Don’t follow any advice, no matter how good, until you feel as deeply in your spirit as you think in your mind that the counsel is wise.
Self-suggestion makes you master of yourself.
An ounce of cheerfulness is worth a pound of sadness to serve God with.
There is no pain equal to that which two lovers can inflict on one another. This should be made clear to all who contemplate such a union. The avoidance of this pain is the beginning of wisdom, for it is strong enough to contaminate the rest of our lives.
In the vain laughter of folly wisdom hears half its applause.
Our great power does not mean we can do whatever we want whenever we want, nor should we assume we have all the wisdom and knowledge necessary to succeed.
The wisdom of crowds works when the crowd is choosing the price of an ox, when there’s a single numeric average. But if it’s a design or something that matters, the decision is made by committee, and that’s crap. You want people and groups who are able to think thoughts before they share.
