“The fool generalizes the particular; the nerd particularizes the general; … the wise does neither.”

Of Boldness
Essays (1625)

Source: More Money than Brains (2010), Chapter One, Don't Need No Edjumacation, p. 12

King v. The College of Physicians (1797), 7 T. R. 290.

Annotations to Sir Joshua Reynolds's Discourses, pp. xvii–xcviii (c. 1798–1809)
1790s

A Hero of Our Time (1840; rev. 1841)

Introduction, Section IV, Of Theory, p. 7.
Institutes of Moral Philosophy (1769)

Book II, ch. 4 (trans. Constance Garnett)
The Elder Zossima, speaking to Mrs. Khoklakov
The Brothers Karamazov (1879–1880)
Context: "It's just the same story as a doctor once told me," observed the elder. "He was a man getting on in years, and undoubtedly clever. He spoke as frankly as you, though in jest, in bitter jest. 'I love humanity,' he said, 'but I wonder at myself. The more I love humanity in general, the less I love man in particular. In my dreams,' he said, 'I have often come to making enthusiastic schemes for the service of humanity, and perhaps I might actually have faced crucifixion if it had been suddenly necessary; and yet I am incapable of living in the same room with any one for two days together, as I know by experience. As soon as any one is near me, his personality disturbs my self-complacency and restricts my freedom. In twenty-four hours I begin to hate the best of men: one because he's too long over his dinner; another because he has a cold and keeps on blowing his nose. I become hostile to people the moment they come close to me. But it has always happened that the more I detest men individually the more ardent becomes my love for humanity.'"

‘Wisdom of Aphorisms’, New York Times, 30th April 1983.

"In Plato's Cave", p. 21
On Photography (1977)