It is a characteristic of wisdom not to do desperate things
Source: Walden (1854)
Topic
The range here is deliberately varied — Colton, Spurgeon, and Defoe on thankfulness and discontent sit alongside Kierkegaard on the spectacle of people travelling to gape at things and thinking they have seen something. Wisdom in this collection is not knowledge accumulated but knowledge applied: the ability to distinguish what matters from what is merely urgent. Several quotes warn against the vanity of thinking yourself wise. The best pieces suggest that wisdom is easier to recognise in others than in yourself, and that its first sign is usually a willingness to remain quiet. Most of these writers treat it less as a possession than as a practice — something you approach but never quite complete.
It is a characteristic of wisdom not to do desperate things
The wrath of the lion is the wisdom of God
If the lion was advised by the fox, he would be cunning
If the fool would persist in his folly he would become wise
The tigers of wrath are wiser than the horses of instruction
I think, therefore I am.
All our discontents about what we want appeared to me to spring from the want of thankfulness for what we have.
It is never too late to be wise.
It is wrong always, everywhere and for any one, to believe anything upon insufficient evidence.
Integrity without knowledge is weak and useless, and knowledge without integrity is dangerous and dreadful.
Man is but a reed, the most feeble thing in nature; but he is a thinking reed.
All things excellent are as difficult as they are rare.
All government, indeed every human benefit and enjoyment, every virtue, and every prudent act, is founded on compromise and barter.
Never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.
It is not the critic who counts.
The best kind of revenge is, not to become like unto them.
Love is the life out of which are fashioned all the natural feelings, every emotion of man.
The good life is one inspired by love and guided by knowledge.
And love is something eternal, it changes its aspect but not its foundation.
Philosophy is written in that great book which ever lies before our eyes, I mean the universe, but we cannot understand it if we do not first learn the language and grasp the symbols in which it is written.