“The fool doth think he is wise, but the wise man knows himself to be a fool.”
William Shakespeare As You Like It
Touchstone, Act V, scene i
Source: As You Like It (1599–1600)
“A man may be a fool and not know it — but not if he is married.”
1940s–present, A Mencken Chrestomathy (1949)
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H.L. Mencken281
American journalist and writer 1880–1956Related quotes
“The fool doth think he is wise, but the wise man knows himself to be a fool.”
Anatole France (1844–1924) French writer
Touchstone, Act V, scene i
Misattributed
“A man never knows what a fool he is until he hears himself imitated by one.”
Herbert Beerbohm Tree (1852–1917) English actor and theatre manager
Quoted by Max Beerbohm in Hebert Beerbohm Tree: Some Memories of Him and of His Art Collected by Max Beerbohm http://books.google.com/books?id=wM08AAAAIAAJ&q="A+man+never+knows+what+a+fool+he+is+until+he+hears+himself+imitated+by+one"&pg=PA312#v=onepage (1920).
“A fool boasts about what little he knows. A wise man keeps quiet about what he knows and is safe.”
Sarvajna Kannada poet, pragmatist and philosopher
Flowers of Wisdom
Jerome David Salinger book Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters and Seymour: An Introduction
Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters and Seymour: An Introduction (1963), Seymour: An Introduction (1959)
“The happiness of a married man depends on the people he has not married.”
Oscar Wilde A Woman of No Importance
Source: A Woman of No Importance
“If any man among you seemeth to be wise in this world, let him become a fool, that he may be wise.”
Paul of Tarsus book First Epistle to the Corinthians
1 Corinthians 3:18 (KJV)
First Epistle to the Corinthians
Henry George (1839–1897) American economist
Introduction : The Reason for the Examination
A Perplexed Philosopher (1892)
Context: The respect for authority, the presumption in favor of those who have won intellectual reputation, is within reasonable limits, both prudent and becoming. But it should not be carried too far, and there are some things especially as to which it behooves us all to use our own judgment and to maintain free minds. For not only does the history of the world show that undue deference to authority has been the potent agency through which errors have been enthroned and superstitions perpetuated, but there are regions of thought in which the largest powers and the greatest acquirements cannot guard against aberrations or assure deeper insight. One may stand on a box and look over the heads of his fellows, but he no better sees the stars. The telescope and the microscope reveal depths which to the unassisted vision are closed. Yet not merely do they bring us no nearer to the cause of suns and animal-cula, but in looking through them the observer must shut his eyes to what lies about him. That intension is at the expense of extension is seen in the mental as in the physical sphere. A man of special learning may be a fool as to common relations. And that he who passes for an intellectual prince may be a moral pauper there are examples enough to show.