Quotes on “wisdom”

You look up when you wish to be exalted. And I look down because I am exalted.

Happiness is not in the mere possession of money; it lies in the joy of achievement, in the thrill of creative effort.

Education is no substitute for intelligence.

There is no escape—we pay for the violence of our ancestors.

It is easier to be wise for others than for ourselves.

I finally know the difference between pleasing and loving, obeying and respecting. It has taken me so many years to be okay with being different, and with being this alive, this intense. (xxvi)

Don't be afraid of the shadows, that only means there's a light nearby.

Anger exceeding limits causes fear and excessive kindness eliminates respect.

No, that is the great fallacy: the wisdom of old men. They do not grow wise. They grow careful.

Madame, all stories, if continued far enough, end in death, and he is no true-story teller who would keep that from you.

Life doesn't make any sense, and we all pretend it does. Comedy's job is to point out that it doesn't make sense, and that it doesn't make much difference anyway.

The moment a little boy is concerned with which is a jay and which is a sparrow, he can no longer see the birds or hear them sing.

In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.

Death, therefore, the most awful of evils, is nothing to us, seeing that, when we are, death is not come, and, when death is come, we are not.

Treachery and violence are spears pointed at both ends; they wound those who resort to them worse than their enemies.

We spend January 1st walking through our lives, room by room, drawing up a list of work to be done, cracks to be patched. Maybe this year, to balance the list, we ought to walk through the rooms of our lives...not looking for flaws, but for potential.

Yet what keeps me from dissolving right now into a complete fairy-tale shimmer is this solid truth, a truth which has veritably built my bones over the last few years--I was not rescued by a prince; I was the administrator of my own rescue.

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