Browse 5655 quotes about Wise.
“If you study Japanese art you see a man who is undoubtedly wise, philosophic and intelligent, who spends his time how? In studying the distance between the earth and the moon? No. In studying the policy of Bismarck? No. He studies a single blade of grass. But this blade of grass leads him to draw every plant and then the seasons, the wide aspects of the countryside, then animals, then the human figure. So he passes his life, and life is too short to do the whole.”
“As you are old and reverend, you should be wise.”
Source: The plays of William Shakespeare: in twenty-one volumes, with the corrections and illustrations of various commentators, to which are added notes
“The wise does at once what the fool does at last.”
“Better mad with the rest of the world than wise alone.”
Source: The Art of Worldly Wisdom
“A wise man gets more use from his enemies than a fool from his friends.”
“There are circumstances of peculiar difficulty and danger, where a mediocrity of talent is the most fatal quantum that a man can possibly possess. Had Charles the First and Louis the Sixteenth been more wise or more weak, more firm or more yielding, in either case they had both of them saved their heads.”
Source: Remarks on the Talents of Lord Byron and the Tendencies of Don Juan
“Lord Bacon has compared those who move in higher spheres to those heavenly bodies in the firmament, which have much admiration, but little rest. And it is not necessary to invest a wise man with power to convince him that it is a garment bedizened with gold, which dazzles the beholder by its splendor, but oppresses the wearer by its weight.”
Source: Lacon: Or Many Things in Few Words, Addressed to Those who Think
“It was served of the Jesuits, that they constantly inculcated a thorough contempt of worldly things in their doctrines, but eagerly grasped at them in their lives. They were wise in their generation; for they cried down worldly things because they wanted to obtain them, and cried up spiritual things, because they wanted to dispose of them.”
“Even knowledge has to be in the fashion, and where it is not, it is wise to affect ignorance.”
“The wise traveler is he who is perpetually surprised.”
“For the multitude of worldly friends profiteth not, nor may strong helpers anything avail, nor wise counselors give profitable counsel, nor the cunning of doctors give consolation, nor riches deliver in time of need, nor a secret place to defend, if Thou, Lord, do not assist, help, comfort, counsel, inform, and defend.”
“A wise and good man will turn examples of all sorts to his own advantage. The good he will make his patterns, and strive to equal or excel them. The bad he will by all means avoid.”
“Wise men, like wine, are best when old; pretty women, like bread, are best when young.”
“In prosperous fortunes be modest and wise, The greatest may fall, and the lowest may rise: But insolent People that fall in disgrace, Are wretched and nobody pities their Case.”
Source: A Benjamin Franklin reader: the essential writings of a colonial sage ; Autobiography, Wit & wisdom
“The realm of death seems an enemy's country to most men, on whose shores they are loathly driven by stress of weather; to the wise man it is the desired port where he moors his bark gladly, as in some quiet haven of the Fortunate Isles; it is the golden west into which his sun sinks, and, sinking, casts back a glory upon the leaden cloud-tack which had darkly besieged his day.”
Source: Conversations on Some of the Old Poets
“A statue lies hid in a block of marble, and the art of the statuary only clears away the superfluous matter and removes the rubbish. The figure is in the stone; the sculptor only finds it. What sculpture is to a block of marble, education is to a human soul. The philosopher, the saint, or the hero,--the wise, the good, or the great man,--very often lies hid and concealed in a plebeian, which a proper education might have disinterred, and have brought to light.”
Source: The works of ... Joseph Addison, with notes by R. Hurd
“The hours of a wise man are lengthened by his ideas, as those of a fool are by his passions. The time of the one is long, because he does not know what to do with it; so is that of the other, because he distinguishes every moment of it with useful or amusing thoughts--or, in other words, because the one is always wishing it away, and the other always enjoying it.”
Source: The works of Joseph Addison: including the whole contents of Bp. Hurd's edition, with letters and other pieces not found in any previous collection; and Macaulay's essay on his life and works
“In the common run of mankind, for one that is wise and good you find ten of a contrary character.”
Source: Works, including the whole contents of Bp. Hurd's edition: withletters and other pieces not found in any previous collection; and Macaulay's essay on his life and works
“Go to bed early, get up early-this is wise.”
Source: Mark Twain at Your Fingertips: A Book of Quotations
“May I deem the wise man rich, and may I have such a portion of gold as none but a prudent man can either bear or employ.”
Source: The Works of Plato: A New and Literal Version, Chiefly from the Text of Stallbaum
“To escape from evil we must be made as far as possible like God; and the resemblance consists in becoming just and holy and wise.”
Source: Wit and Wisdom of Socrates, Plato, Aristotle: Being a Treasury of Thousands of Glorious, Inspiring and Imperishable Thoughts, Views and Observations of the Three Great Greek Philosophers, Classified Under about Four Hundred Subjects for Comparative Study
“The god, O men, seems to me to be really wise; and by his oracle to mean this, that the wisdom of this world is foolishness and of none effect.”
“There is no gown or garment that worse becomes a woman than when she will be wise.”
Source: The Table Talk of Martin Luther
“In an unfamiliar culture, it is wise to offer no innovations, no suggestions, or lessons.”
Source: Rainbow in the Cloud: The Wisdom and Spirit of Maya Angelou
“I used to think there would be a blinding flash of light someday, and then I would be wise and calm and would know how to cope with everything and my kids would rise up and call me blessed. Now I see that whatever I'm like, I'm pretty well stuck with it for life. Hell of a revelation that turned out to be.”
“Show is not substance; realities govern wise men.”
Source: Franklin's Way to Wealth and Penn's Maxims
“A wise person decides slowly but abides by these decisions.”
“Nothing is so dangerous as an ignorant friend; a wise enemy is worth more.
[Fr., Rien n'est si dangereux qu'un ignorant ami;
Mieux vaudrait un sage ennemi.]”
“Greatness, thou gaudy torment of out souls,
The wise man's fetter, and the rage of fools.”
“No wise man has called a change of opinion in constancy.”
“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?”
Source: Fierce Wars and Faithful Loves: Edmund Spenser's The Faerie Queene
“Without oblivion, there is no remembrance possible. When both oblivion and memory are wise, when the general soul of man is clear, melodious, true, there may come a modern Iliad as memorial of the Past.”
Source: Oliver Cromwell's Letters and Speeches: With Elucidations
“We are to take no counsel with flesh and blood; give ear to no vain cavils, vain sorrows and wishes; to know that we know nothing, that the worst and cruelest to our eyes is not what it seems, that we have to receive whatsoever befalls us as sent from God above, and say, "It is good and wise,--God is great! Though He slay me, yet I trust in Him." Islam means, in its way, denial of self. This is yet the highest wisdom that heaven has revealed to our earth.”
“Wise man was he who counselled that speculation should have free course, and look fearlessly towards all the thirty-two points of the compass, whithersoever and howsoever it listed.”
Source: The Works of Thomas Carlyle
“On their return from a trip, it is wise to see friends promptly, before they've had time to get their pictures developed.”
Source: On Getting Old for the First Time
“It is not always wise to appear singular.”
“God lead us past the setting of the sun
To wizard islands, of august surprise;
God make our blunders wise.”
Source: The poetry of Vachel Lindsay: complete & with Lindsay's drawings
“One wise man's verdict outweighs all the fools'.”
Source: The Poems of Browning: 1847-1861
“Bets at first were fool-traps, where the wise like spiders lay in ambush for the flies.”
Source: The works of John Dryden now first collected ...
“Fortune confounds the wise,
And when they least expect it turns the dice.”
Source: The Poetical Works of John Dryden
“The wise man sets bounds even to his innocent desires.”
“The Wise (Minstrel or Sage,) out of their books are clay; But in their books, as from their graves they rise. Angels--that, side by side, upon our way, Walk with and warn us!”
“A wise man needes not blush for changing his purpose.”
Source: The works of the rev. George Herbert, with remarks on his writings, and a sketch of his life, by W. Jerdan
“Fooles bite one another, but wise-men agree together.”
Source: The Complete Works of George Herbert: Prose
“A wise judge, by the craft of the law, was never seduced from its purpose.”
“A good man and a wise man may at times be angry with the world, at times grieved for it; but be sure no man was ever discontented with the world who did his duty in it.”
Source: The life and correspondence of Robert Southey. Ed. by C.C. Southey
“Forbear, you things
That stand upon the pinnacles of state,
To boast your slippery height! when you do fall,
You dash yourselves in pieces, ne'er to rise:
And he that lends you pity, is not wise.”
Source: Sejanus His Fall
“To swear is neither brave, polite, nor wise.”
“Whatever be the motives which induce men to write,--whether avarice or fame,--the country becomes more wise and happy in which they most serve for instructors.”
Source: The miscellaneous works of Oliver Goldsmith
“Titles and mottoes to books are like escutcheons and dignities in the hands of a king. The wise sometimes condescend to accept of them; but none but a fool would imagine them of any real importance. We ought to depend upon intrinsic merit, and not the slender helps of the title.”
Source: Essays and The Bee