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To reform a world, to reform a nation, no wise man will undertake; and all but foolish men know, that the only solid, though a far slower reformation, is what each begins and perfects on himself.
Sep 10, 2025
I train very hard, until I am sick. Sometimes I train like a foolish man who has no mind.
Some immemorial imbecilities have been added deliberately, on the ground that it is just as interesting to note how foolish men have been as to note how wise they have been.
You do not see clearly the evil in yourself, else you would hate yourself with all your soul. Like the lion who sprang at his image in the water, you are only hurting yourself, O foolish man. When you reach the bottom of the well of your own nature, then you will know that the vileness was from yourself.
A foolish man... built his house upon the sand.
I don't want to give too much ink to foolish men.
Passion often makes a fool of the cleverest man and often makes the most foolish men clever
The foolish man wonders at the unusual, but the wise man at the usual.
A foolish man is always doing, Yet much remains to be done.
It is a foolish man who believes that the status quo can be maintained indefinitely.
Man is so perfectable and corruptible he can become a fool through good sense.
A foolish man tells a woman to stop talking, but a wise man tells her that her mouth is extremely beautiful when her lips are closed.
A foolish man thinks he knows everything. A wise man knows he doesn't.
A wise man's heart directs him toward the right, but a foolish man's heart directs him toward the left.
He Who Knows And Knows That He Knows Is A Wise Man - Follow Him; He Who Knows Not And Knows Not That He Knows Not Is A Fool - Shun Him
The mistakes of the fool are known to the world, but not to himself. The mistakes of the wise man are known to himself, but not to the world.
The fool sees naught but folly; and the madman only madness. Yesterday I asked a foolish man to count the fools among us. He laughed and said, "This is too hard a thing to do, and it will take too long. Were it not better to count only the wise?"
The follies of the wise man are known to himself, but hidden from the world.
The heart of a fool is in his mouth, but the mouth of a wise man is in his heart.
A wise man gets more use from his enemies than a fool from his friends.
Oh these foolish men! They could not create so much as a worm, but they create gods by the dozens.
Not all men (and especially the wisest) share the opinion that it is bad for women to be educated. But it is very true that many foolish men have claimed this because it displeased them that women knew more than they did.
Foolish men imagine that because judgment for an evil thing is delayed, there is no justice; but only accident here below. Judgment for an evil thing is many times delayed some day or two, some century or two, but it is sure as life, it is sure as death.
Unless a man has pity he is not truly a man. If a man has not wept at the worlds pain he is only half a man, and there will always be pain in the world, knowing this does not mean that a man shall dispair. A good man will seek to take pain out of things. A foolish man will not even notice it, except in himself, and the poor unfortunate evil man will drive pain deeper into things and spread it about wherever he goes.
Who is more foolish, the child afraid of the dark or the man afraid of the light?
A foolish man thinks he knows everything. A wise man knows he doesn't," Finn replied absently, still looking down at the book. "That's such a fortune-cookie answer," I said with a laugh, and even he smirked at me.
I believe that that foolish man of Galilee, Jesus Christ, had something to tell us, to tell me. Not considering his existence here, I would immediately go into despair. Immediately. And forgetting him, I would first despair of the institutional church and its hierarchy, and only later, of the Jews.
A clever child brought up with a foolish one can itself become foolish. Man is so perfectible and corruptible he can become a fool through good sense.
Passion often renders the most clever man a fool, and sometimes renders the most foolish man clever.
Every man is a damn fool for at least five minutes every day; wisdom consists in not exceeding the limit.
He promoted the education of the parish clergy and wrote: He seems to me a very foolish man, and very wretched, who will not increase his understanding while he is in the world, and ever wish and long to reach that endless life where all shall be made clear.
A wise man who stands firm is a statesman, a foolish man who stands firm is a catastrophe.
My parents never had any money. It was cash flow. It flows, and you got your fingers in it for a little while, and it flows away. That's all I know about money. And I don't know, it flows and it's a river, but you can never, ever keep it. As an artist, I can't keep it. But hey, a man who dies with a cent in the bank is a foolish man. So I guess I'm going against the conservators. I'm a spendthrift.
The wise are wise only because they love.
The worldly wisdom of the foolish man Is like a sieve, that does alone retain The grosser substance of the worthless bran: But thou, my soul, let thy brave thoughts disdain So coarse a purchase: O be thou a fan To purge the chaff, and keep the winnow'd grain: Make clean thy thoughts, and dress thy mixt desires: Thou art Heav'n's tasker, and thy God requires The purest of thy flow'r, as well as of thy fires.
I've married a man who owns nine cows," said Jinjur to Ozma, "and now I am happy and contented and willing to lead a quiet life and mind my own business." "Where is your husband?" asked Ozma. "He is in the house, nursing a black eye," replied Jinjur, calmly. "The foolish man would insist upon milking the red cow when I wanted him to milk the white one; but he will know better next time, I am sure.
Fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves.
A fool thinks himself to be wise, but a wise man knows himself to be a fool.
Much has been said of the loneliness of wisdom, and how much the Truth seeker becomes a pilgrim wandering from star to star. To the ignorant, the wise man is lonely because he abides in distant heights of the mind. But the wise man himself does not feel lonely. Wisdom brings him nearer to life; closer to the heart of the world than the foolish man can ever be. Bookishness may lead to loneliness, and scholarship may end in a battle of beliefs, but the wise man gazing off into space sees not an emptiness, but a space full of life, truth, and law.
A foolish man in wealth and authority is like a weak-timbered house with a too-ponderous roof.
A fool sees not the same tree that a wise man sees.
A wise man can learn more from a foolish question than a fool can learn from a wise answer.
A mother takes twenty years to make a man of her boy, and another woman makes a fool of him in twenty minutes.
Fools rush in where angels fear to tread.
The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, and wiser people so full of doubts.
The ultimate result of shielding men from the effects of folly, is to fill the world with fools.
Alcohol is perfectly consistent in its effects upon man. Drunkenness is merely an exaggeration. A foolish man drunk becomes maudlin; a bloody man, vicious; a coarse man, vulgar.
When a wise man is advised of his errors, he will reflect on and improve his conduct. When his misconduct is pointed out, a foolish man will not only disregard the advice but rather repeat the same error.
Wise men don't need advice. Fools won't take it.
Whoever is wise is apt to suspect and be diffident of himself, and upon that account is willing to "hearken unto counsel"; whereas the foolish man, being in proportion to his folly full of himself, and swallowed up in conceit, will seldom take any counsel but his own, and for that very reason, because it is his own.