Ignorant Quotes - Page 6

• A great man la an abstraction of some one excellence; but whoever fancies himself an abstraction of excellence, so far from being great, may be sure that he is a blockhead, equally ignorant of excellence or defect of himself or others.

  William Hazlitt

  Men, Excellence, May

  William Hazlitt (2005). “The Fight and Other Writings”, p.464, Penguin UK

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• He who expects from a great name in politics, in philosophy, in art, equal greatness in other things, is little versed in human nature. Our strength lies in our weakness. The learned in books are ignorant of the world. He who is ignorant of books is often well acquainted with other things; for life is of the same length in the learned and unlearned; the mind cannot be idle; if it is not taken up with one thing, it attends to another through choice or necessity; and the degree of previous capacity in one class or another is a mere lottery.

  William Hazlitt

  Art, Lying, Philosophy

  William Hazlitt (2015). “Delphi Collected Works of William Hazlitt (Illustrated)”, p.1471, Delphi Classics

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• Nothing is so dangerous as an ignorant friend; a wise enemy is worth more.
  [Fr., Rien n'est si dangereux qu'un ignorant ami;
  Mieux vaudrait un sage ennemi.]

  Jean de La Fontaine

  Wise, Ignorance, Enemy

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• Good sense and good-nature are never separated, though the ignorant world has thought otherwise. Good-nature, by which I mean beneficence and candor, is the product of right reason.

  John Dryden

  Mean, World, Reason

  John Dryden (1750). “Select essays on the belles lettres”, p.95

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• Have charity; have patience; have mercy. Never bring a human being, however silly, ignorant, or weak--above all, any little child--to shame and confusion of face. Never by petulance, by suspicion, by ridicule, even by selfish and silly haste--never, above all, by indulging in the devilish pleasure of a sneer--crush what is finest and rouse up what is coarsest in the heart of any fellow-creature.

  Charles Kingsley

  Crush, Children, Selfish

  Charles Kingsley (2008). “Daily Thoughts (EasyRead Super Large 18pt Edition)”, p.253, ReadHowYouWant.com

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• Tis not the wholesome sharp mortality,
  Or modest anger of a satiric spirit,
  That hurts or wounds the body of a state,
  But the sinister application
  Of the malicious, ignorant, and base
  Interpreter; who will distort and strain
  The general scope and purpose of an author
  To his particular and private spleen.

  Ben Jonson

  Hurt, Criticism, Purpose

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• There is a sort of knowledge beyond the power of learning to bestow, and this is to be had in conversation; so necessary is this to the understanding the characters of men, that none are more ignorant of them than those learned pedants whose lives have been entirely consumed in colleges and among books; for however exquisitely human nature may have been described by writers the true practical system can be learned only in the world.

  Henry Fielding

  Book, Character, College

  Henry Fielding (1818). “Select Works of Henry Fielding Esq: To which is Prefaced an Original Account of the Life and Writings of the Author”, p.5

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• There never was any party, faction, sect, or cabal whatsoever, in which the most ignorant were not the most violent; for a bee is not a busier animal than a blockhead.

  Alexander Pope

  Party, Animal, Bees

  Alexander Pope (1812). “The works of Alexander Pope. With a selection of explanatory notes, and the account of his life by dr. Johnson”, p.227

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• Does a man reproach thee for being proud or ill-natured, envious or conceited, ignorant or detracting? Consider with thyself whether his reproaches are true. If they are not, consider that thou art not the person whom he reproaches, but that he reviles an imaginary being, and perhaps loves what thou really art, though he hates what thou appearest to be.

  Epictetus

  Art, Hate, Conceited

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• There is no slight danger from general ignorance; and the only choice which Providence has graciously left to a vicious government is either to fall by the people, if they are suffered to become enlightened, or with them, if they are kept enslaved and ignorant.

  Samuel Taylor Coleridge

  Fall, Ignorance, Government

  Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1867). “The Friend: a series of essays ... First American, from the second London edition”, p.40

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• Those who quit their proper character to assume what does not belong to them are, for the greater part, ignorant both of the character they leave and of the character they assume.

  Edmund Burke

  Character, Doe, Quitting

  Edmund Burke (2008). “The Writings and Speeches of Edmund Burke”, p.246, Cosimo, Inc.

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• Lawsuits generally originate with the obstinate and the ignorant, but they do not end with them; and that lawyer was right who left all his money to the support of an asylum for fools and lunatics, saying that from such he got it, and to such he would bequeath it.

  Jeremy Bentham

  Support, Asylums, Fool

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• I think the world is in the mess it's in because we are spiritually ignorant.

  Shirley MacLaine

  Thinking, World, Spirituality

  Shirley MacLaine (1987). “It's all in the playing”, Bantam

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• Lord, for the erring thought
  Not unto evil wrought:
  Lord, for the wicked will
  Betrayed, and baffled still:
  For the heart from itself kept,
  Our thanksgiving accept.
  For ignorant hopes that were
  Broken to our blind prayer:
  For pain, death, sorrow, sent
  Unto our chastisement:
  For all loss of seeming good,
  Quicken our gratitude.

  William Dean Howells

  Gratitude, Prayer, Pain

  William Dean Howells (2015). “Delphi Complete Works of William Dean Howells (Illustrated)”, p.9085, Delphi Classics

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• Certainly I do not wish that instead of these masters I had read baby books, written down to children, and with such ignorant dullness that they blunt the sense and corrupt the tastes of the still plastic human being. But I do wish that I had read no books at all till later - that I had lived with toys, and played in the open air. Children should not cull the fruits of reflection and observation early, but expand in the sun, and let thoughts come to them. They should not through books antedate their actual experiences.

  Margaret Fuller

  Baby, Children, Book

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• A theme is always necessary, a plain, simple, unadorned theme to confuse the ignorant.

  Lillian Hellman

  Simple, Deception, Theme

  Lillian Hellman (1976). “Scoundrel time”

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• History is made by masses of people. One man, or ten men, don't start the earthquakes and don't stop them either. Only hero worshipers and ignorant historians think they do.

  Lillian Hellman

  Hero, Men, Thinking

  Lillian Hellman (1944). “The Searching Wind: A Play in Two Acts”, New York : The Viking Press

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• Duty itself is supreme delight when love is the inducement and labor. By such a principle the ignorant are enlightened, the hard-hearted softened, the disobedient reformed, and the faithful encouraged.

  Hosea Ballou

  Love Is, Faithful, Principles

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• I have known several persons of great fame for wisdom in public affairs and councils governed by foolish servants. I have known great ministers, distinguished for wit and learning, who preferred none but dunces. I have known men of valor cowards to their wives. I have known men of cunning perpetually cheated. I knew three ministers who would exactly compute and settle the accounts of a kingdom, wholly ignorant of their own economy.

  Horace Walpole

  Men, Wife, Coward

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• The monstrosity of bureaucracy, I thought: always the pint-pot judging the gallon, the scribe's, the door-keeper's world. Always the stupidity of people who feel certain about things they never try to find out. A world that educates people to be ignorant - that is what this world of ours is.

  Freya Stark

  Doors, Judging, People

  Freya Stark (1964). “The Journey's Echo: Selections”

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• most people did not care to be taught what they did not already know; it made them feel ignorant.

  Mary McCarthy

  Education, Learning, People

  Mary McCarthy (2017). “Mary McCarthy: Novels 1963-1979”, p.397, Library of America

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• As to ethics, unfortunately, we are still at sea. We never did have any popular base for what little ethics we knew, except the religious theories, and now that our faith is shaken in those theories we cannot account for ethics at all. It is no wonder we behave badly, we are literally ignorant of the laws of ethics, which is the simplest of sciences, the most necessary, the most continuously needed. The childish misconduct of our 'revolted youth' is quite equaled by that of older people, and neither young nor old seem to have any understanding of the reasons why conduct is 'good' or 'bad.

  Charlotte Perkins Gilman

  Religious, Sea, Law

  Charlotte Perkins Gilman (1935). “The Living of Charlotte Perkins Gilman: An Autobiography”, p.323, Univ of Wisconsin Press

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• I'm intelligent enough and capable enough to understand that you are ignorant, pompous, egotistical, cretin. I'm going to crush you on here because I'm tired of hearing about it.

  Richard Sherman

  Crush, Tired, Intelligent

  "Richard Sherman Still Talking, Taunting This Morning" by Colleen Curry, abcnews.go.com. January 20, 2014.

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• As the fish doesn't know water, people are ignorant of space. Consciousness is concerned only with changing and varying details; it ignores constants-especially constant backgrounds. Thus only very exceptional people are aware of what is basic to everything.

  Alan Watts

  Space, People, Water

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• We cannot avoid the globalization of knowledge and information. When I was a boy growing up in Kansas, I could never think about a Buddhist, or a Hindu, or Muslim, or even a Protestant - I grew up in such a Catholic ghetto. That's not possible anymore, unless you live in a cave or something. So either we have knowledge of what the other religions and other denominations are saying, and how they tie into the common thread, or we end up just being dangerously ignorant of other people and therefore prejudiced.

  Richard Rohr

  Buddhist, Growing Up, Ghetto

  Source: ryanthomasneace.com

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