Wit And Wisdom Quotes

The difference between the almost right word and the right word is really a large matter. ’tis the difference between the lightning bug and the lightning.

Good girls go to heaven, bad girls go everywhere.

All discarded lovers should be given a second chance, but with somebody else.

There are women who make things better... simply by showing up. There are women who make things happen. There are women who make their way. There are women who make a difference. And women who make us smile. There are women of wit and wisdom who- through strength and courage- make it through. There are women who change the world everyday... Women like you.

If Christ were here there is one thing he would not be—a Christian.

In my whole life, I have known no wise people (over a broad subject matter area) who didn't read all the time -- none, zero. You'd be amazed at how much Warren reads--and at how much I read. My children laugh at me. They think I'm a book with a couple of legs sticking out.

When the last living thing Has died on account of us, How poetical it would be If Earth could say, In a voice floating up Perhaps From the floor Of the Grand Canyon, "It is done." People did not like it here.

Spend each day trying to be a little wiser than you were when you woke up. Day by day, and at the end of the day-if you live long enough-like most people, you will get out of life what you deserve.

When I told the people of Northern Ireland that I was an atheist, a woman in the audience stood up and said, 'Yes, but is it the God of the Catholics or the God of the Protestants in whom you don't believe?

I would rather be able to appreciate things I cannot have than to have things I am not able to appreciate.

If an apology is followed by an excuse or a reason, it means they are going to commit same mistake again they just apologized for.

Wit seduces by signaling intelligence without nerdiness.

Be respectful to your superiors, if you have any.

How to find a good spouse? -the best single way is to deserve a good spouse.

There is no better teacher than history in determining the future... There are answers worth billions of dollars in 30$ history book.

Any book which inspires us to lead a better life is a good book.

The best way to measure the loss of intellectual sophistication - this "nerdification," to put it bluntly - is in the growing disappearance of sarcasm, as mechanic minds take insults a bit too literally.

Acquire worldly wisdom and adjust your behavior accordingly. If your new behavior gives you a little temporary unpopularity with your peer group…then to hell with them.

It takes character to sit with all that cash and to do nothing. I didn't get top where I am by going after mediocre opportunities.

Everyone longs to be loved. And the greatest thing we can do is to let people know that they are loved and capable of loving.

Politeness is the first thing people lose once they get the power.

What are the secret of success? -one word answer :"rational

Intelligence is more important than strength, that is why earth is ruled by men and not by animals.

A fool may scrawl on a slate and if no one has the wit to wipe it clean for a thousand years, the scrawl becomes the wisdom of ages.

I have been finding treasures in places I did not want to search. I have been hearing wisdom from tongues I did not want to listen. I have been finding beauty where I did not want to look. And I have learned so much from journeys I did not want to take. Forgive me, O Gracious One; for I have been closing my ears and eyes for too long. I have learned that miracles are only called miracles because they are often witnessed by only those who can can see through all of life's illusions. I am ready to see what really exists on other side, what exists behind the blinds, and taste all the ugly fruit instead of all that looks right, plump and ripe.

I have read my books by many lights, hoarding their beauty, their wit or wisdom against the dark days when I would have no book, nor a place to read. I have known hunger of the belly kind many times over, but I have known a worse hunger: the need to know and to learn.

There's a world of difference between insisting on someone's doing something and establishing an atmosphere in which that person can grow into wanting to do it.

The best armour of old age is a well spent life perfecting it.

One of the universal fears of childhood is the fear of not having value in the eyes of the people whom we admire so much.

When you are angry try your best to go to sleep, it keeps you away from speaking, writing and thinking while you are angry.

We speak with more than our mouths. We listen with more than our ears.

The job of feets is walking, but their hobby is dancing.

Even if you're on the right track, you'll get run over if you just sit there.

This is the time to remember that I’m the protagonist in my own story, facing every challenge with grace and wit.

Memories make you sentimental, experiences make you smart.

As human beings, our job in life is to help people realize how rare and valuable each one of us really is, that each of us has something that no one else has- or ever will have- something inside that is unique to all time. It's our job to encourage each other to discover that uniqueness and to provide ways of developing its expression.

Seeing the mud around a lotus is pessimism, seeing a lotus in the mud is optimism.

I think that, every time you see the word EBITDA, you should substitute the words "bullshit earnings.

Anger gets you into trouble, ego keeps you in trouble.

Some men, as they age, grow kinder. I am not one of those, for I have seen how the cosmere can mistreat the innocent - and that leaves me disinclined toward kindness. Some men, as they age, grow wiser. I am not one of those, for wisdom and I have always been at cross-purposes, and I have yet to learn the tongue in which she speaks. Some men, as they age, grow more cynical. I, fortunately, am not one of those. If I were, the very air would warp around me, sucking in all emotion, leaving only scorn. Other men...other men, as they age, merely grow stranger. I fear that I am one of those. I am the bones of a foreign species left drying on the plain that was once, long ago, a sea. A curiosity, perhaps a reminder, that all has not always been as it is now.

The only way to keep your health is to eat what you don’t want, drink what you don’t like, and do what you’d druther not.

It's the work on your desk. Do well with what you already have and more will come in.

was I chosen?’ ‘Such questions cannot be answered,’ said Gandalf. ‘You may be sure that it was not for any merit that others do not possess: not for power or wisdom, at any rate. But you have been chosen, and you must therefore use such strength and heart and wits as you have.

A nation is great not by its size alone. It is the will, the cohesion, the stamina, the discipline of its people and the quality of their leaders which ensure it an honourable place in history.

Cleverness is like rouge - liberal application makes a woman look common and desperate. Wit is knowing how to apply it.

The best armour of old age is a well spent life preceding it.

A society to be successful must maintain a balance between nurturing excellence and encouraging the average to improve.

Father has a strengthening character like the sun and mother has a soothing temper like the moon.

A truly living human being cannot remain neutral.

In my whole life, I have known no wise people (over a board subject matter area) who didn't read all the time - none, zero. You'd be amazed how much Warren reads - and at how much I read. My children laugh at me. They think I'm a book with a couple of legs sticking out.

I was seldom able to see an opportunity until it had ceased to be one.

As I ate she began the first of what we later called “my lessons in living.” She said that I must always be intolerant of ignorance but understanding of illiteracy. That some people, unable to go to school, were more educated and even more intelligent than college professors. She encouraged me to listen carefully to what country people called mother wit. That in those homely sayings was couched the collective wisdom of generations.

I believe that life is a process of continuous change and a constant struggle to make that change one for the better.

We have come as far as we have because we are the cleverest creatures to have ever lived on Earth. But if we are to continue to exist, we will require more than intelligence. We will require wisdom.

One says the things which one feels the need to say, and which the other will not understand: one speaks for oneself alone.

Wisdom begins with reverence for God." No God, no wisdom (witness your local university).

Listening and trying to understand the needs of those we would communicate with seems to me to be the essential prerequisite of any real communication. And we might as well aim for real communication.

It is better to have a world united than a world divided; but it is also better to have a world divided than a world destroyed.

The Christmas tree is a symbol of love, not money. There's a kind of glory to them when they're all lit up that exceeds anything all the money in the world could buy.

The Wit of Cheats, the Courage of a Whore, Are what ten thousand envy and adore: All, all look up, with reverential Awe, At crimes that 'scape, or triumph o'er the Law: While Truth, Worth, Wisdom, daily they decry-` 'Nothing is sacred now but Villainy' - Epilogue to the Satires, Dialogue I

Arrogant men with knowledge make more noise from their mouth than making a sense from their mind.

Respect cannot be inherited, respect is the result of right actions.

I saw something I could never forget. I saw lifetimes of acknowledgement, fear, wisdom, questioning, and understanding in a child's eye. It was the worst thing I would ever witness.

One of the strongest things I have had to wrestle with in my life is the significance of the longing for perfection in oneself and in the people bound to the self by friendship or parenthood or childhood.

I've often hesitated in beginning a project because I've thought, "It'll never turn out to be even remotely like the good idea I have as I start." I could just "feel" how good it could be. But I decided that, for the present, I would create the best way I know how and accept the ambiguities.

Vivid simplicity is the articulation, the nature of genius. Wisdom is greater than intelligence; intelligence is greater than philosobabble.

I cannot live with someone who can't live without me.

A library implies an act of faith which generations, still in darkness hid, sign in their night in witness of the dawn." À qui la faute? (1872)

A farmer is a magician who produces money from the mud.

We can’t reach old age by another man’s road. My habits protect my life but they would assassinate you.

The gross national product does not allow for the health of our children, the quality of their education, or the joy of their play. It does not include the beauty of our poetry or the strength of our marriages; the intelligence of our public debate or the integrity of our public officials. It measures neither our wit nor our courage; neither our wisdom nor our learning; neither our compassion nor our devotion to our country; it measures everything, in short, except that which makes life worthwhile.

I don't understand this irony - valuable things like cars, gold, diamond are made up of hard materials but most valuable things like money, contracts and books are made up of soft paper.

Mutually caring relationships require kindness and patience, tolerance, optimism, joy in the other's achievements, confidence in oneself, and the ability to give without undue thought of gain. We need to accept the fact that it's not in the power of any human being to provide all these things all the time. for any of us, mutually caring relationships will always include some measure of unkindness and impatience, intolerance, pessimism, envy, self-doubt, and disappointment.

Networking isn't how many people you know, it's how many people know you.

One of the things I love about God's Word is that it has no expiration date.

If you can't impress them with your argument, impress them with your actions.

Anything we don't like, we'll turn it into a happy little tree or something; we don't make mistakes, we just have happy accidents.

Majority wins, but majority is not necessarily right and sometimes majority is awfully wrong.

I chase goals, not girls.

What a hell of a heaven it will be when they get all these hypocrites assembled there!

At this time in history, sick, afraid, and despondent are the general conditions that affect the majority of poeple almost everywhere. It's difficult and challenging to follow the call of conscience when we're under the dark veil of these forces. At the same time, it's painful not to follow it. When you become healthy, courageous, and hopeful, following your conscience becomes easier. When people are healthy, courageous, and hopeful, it's difficult to bend their mind and will. You can't force them to do what you'd like them to do against their will. They will speak out what they believe, and stand up and do what is right even when it means a loss to them. I am hopeful because I have witnessed this change throughout my life. From the realization of what I really am, I became hopeful, courageous, and passionate for life, and I felt responsible for the general condition of humanity and the Earth because they are not separate from me.

I did not know that mankind were suffering for want of gold. I have seen a little of it. I know that it is very malleable, but not so malleable as wit. A grain of gold will gild a great surface, but not so much as a grain of wisdom.

The mere knowledge of a fact is pale; but when you come to realize your fact, it takes on color. It is all the difference between hearing of a man being stabbed to the heart, and seeing it done.

When we shift our focus away from impressing others or asserting ourselves through words and move away from the ego-driven impulse toward self-glorification, we can embrace the wisdom of non-attachment and honor an authentic sense of balance in our interactions with others. ("Esprit d’escalier" - " Staircase Wit")

The important thing to remember is not to forget

In life, as in knitting, don't leave loose ends. Take the time to thank the people who matter in your life.

Go home all you boys who fought with me and help build up the shattered fortunes of our old state

I don't cry. Unfortunately, I seem rather short of tears, so my sorrows have to stay inside me.

The primary feature of women is not a 'beauty', it's a 'mystery'.

The very fact that you're aware of suffering is enough reason to be overjoyed that you're alive and can experience it.

You will miss a normal life while living a successful life, but not as much as the craving for a successful life while you were living a normal life.

We may not be able to witness our own eulogy, but we’re actually writing it all the time, every day.

Too much and too long, we seem to have surrendered community excellence and community values in the mere accumulation of material things. Our gross national product...if we should judge the United States of America by that - counts air pollution and cigarette advertising, and ambulances to clear our highways of carnage. It counts special locks for our doors and the jails for those who break them. It counts the destruction of our redwoods and the loss of our natural wonder in chaotic sprawl. It counts napalm and the cost of a nuclear warhead, and armored cars for police who fight riots in our streets. It counts Whitman's rifle and Speck's knife, and the television programs which glorify violence in order to sell toys to our children. Yet the gross national product does not allow for the health of our children, the quality of their education, or the joy of their play. It does not include the beauty of our poetry or the strength of our marriages; the intelligence of our public debate or the integrity of our public officials. It measures neither our wit nor our courage; neither our wisdom nor our learning; neither our compassion nor our devotion to our country; it measures everything, in short, except that which makes life worthwhile. And it tells us everything about America except why we are proud that we are Americans.

Two things which are the peculiar domain of the heart, not the mind—politics and religion. He doesn’t want to know the other side. He wants arguments and statistics for his own side, and nothing more.

So what is it in a human life that creates bravery, kindness, wisdom, and resilience? What if it's pain? What if it's the struggle?... The bravest people I know are those who've walked through the fire and come out on the other side. They are those who've overcome, not those who've had nothing to overcome. .. (P)eople who are hurting don't need Avoiders, Protectors, or Fixers. What we need are patient, loving witnesses. People to sit quietly and hold space for us. People to stand in helpless vigil to our pain.

This golden droid has been a friend, 'tis true,/ And yet I wish to still his prating tongue!/ An imp, he calleth me? I'll be reveng'd,/ And merry pranks aplenty I shall play/ Upon this pompous droid C-3PO!/ Yet not in language shall my pranks be done:/ Around both humans and droids I must/ Be seen to make such errant beeps and squeaks/ That they shall think me simple. Truly, though,/ Although with sounds obilque I speak to them, I clearly see how I shall play my part,/ And how a vast rebellion shall succeed/ by wit and wisdom of a simple droid. [R2-D2]

No man is as wise as Mother Earth. She has witnessed every human day, every human struggle, every human pain, and every human joy. For maladies of both body and spirit, the wise ones of old pointed man to the hills. For man too is of the dust and Mother Earth stands ready to nurture and heal her children.

There is something inherently stupid about gentrified thinking. It’s a dumbing down and smoothing over of what people are actually like. It’s a social position rooted in received wisdom, with aesthetics blindly selected from the presorted offerings of marketing and without information or awareness about the structures that create its own delusional sense of infallibility. Gentrified thinking is like the bourgeois version of Christian fundamentalism, a huge, unconscious conspiracy of homogenous patterns with no awareness about its own freakishness. The gentrification mentality is rooted in the belief that obedience to consumer identity over recognition of lived experience is actually normal, neutral, and value free.

Men, Kellhus had once told her, were like coins: they had two sides. Where one side of them saw, the other side of them was seen, and though all men were both at once, men could only truly know the side of themselves that saw and the side of others that was seen—they could only truly know the inner half of themselves and the outer half of others. At first Esmenet thought this foolish. Was not the inner half the whole, what was only imperfectly apprehended by others? But Kellhus bid her to think of everything she’d witnessed in others. How many unwitting mistakes? How many flaws of character? Conceits couched in passing remarks. Fears posed as judgements … The shortcomings of men—their limits—were written in the eyes of those who watched them. And this was why everyone seemed so desperate to secure the good opinion of others—why everyone played the mummer. They knew without knowing that what they saw of themselves was only half of who they were. And they were desperate to be whole. The measure of wisdom, Kellhus had said, was found in the distance between these two selves. Only afterward had she thought of Kellhus in these terms. With a kind of surpriseless shock, she realized that not once—not once!—had she glimpsed shortcomings in his words or actions. And this, she understood, was why he seemed limitless, like the ground, which extended from the small circle about her feet to the great circle about the sky. He had become her horizon. For Kellhus, there was no distance between seeing and being seen. He alone was whole. And what was more, he somehow stood from without and saw from within. He made whole …

Father Brendan Flynn: "A woman was gossiping with her friend about a man whom they hardly knew - I know none of you have ever done this. That night, she had a dream: a great hand appeared over her and pointed down on her. She was immediately seized with an overwhelming sense of guilt. The next day she went to confession. She got the old parish priest, Father O' Rourke, and she told him the whole thing. 'Is gossiping a sin?' she asked the old man. 'Was that God All Mighty's hand pointing down at me? Should I ask for your absolution? Father, have I done something wrong?' 'Yes,' Father O' Rourke answered her. 'Yes, you ignorant, badly-brought-up female. You have blamed false witness on your neighbor. You played fast and loose with his reputation, and you should be heartily ashamed.' So, the woman said she was sorry, and asked for forgiveness. 'Not so fast,' says O' Rourke. 'I want you to go home, take a pillow upon your roof, cut it open with a knife, and return here to me.' So, the woman went home: took a pillow off her bed, a knife from the drawer, went up the fire escape to her roof, and stabbed the pillow. Then she went back to the old parish priest as instructed. 'Did you gut the pillow with a knife?' he says. 'Yes, Father.' 'And what were the results?' 'Feathers,' she said. 'Feathers?' he repeated. 'Feathers; everywhere, Father.' 'Now I want you to go back and gather up every last feather that flew out onto the wind,' 'Well,' she said, 'it can't be done. I don't know where they went. The wind took them all over.' 'And that,' said Father O' Rourke, 'is gossip!