quotations about learning
The learned man is only useful to the learned.
JEAN PAUL F. RICHTER
Life of Jean Paul F. Richter
Self-education is, I firmly believe, the only kind of education there is. The only function of a school is to make self-education easier; failing that, it does nothing.
ISAAC ASIMOV
Science Past, Science Future
You live and learn. At any rate, you live.
DOUGLAS ADAMS
Mostly Harmless
That is what learning is. You suddenly understand something you've understood all your life, but in a new way.
DORIS LESSING
The Four-Gated City
A man must cling to the belief that the incomprehensible is comprehensible; otherwise he would not try to fathom it.
JOHANN WOLFGANG VON GOETHE
The Maxims and Reflections of Goethe
It's not really the SATs, the tests themselves, it's what they stand for. It's the scorched earth policy that they create. It's the focus on tedious technicality over inspiring ideas. It's making learning as nit-picky and as joyless as possible.
KATE BYRNE
"Sats are making learning nit-picky and joyless", TES News, May 3, 2016
The more that you read, the more things you will know. The more that you learn, the more places you'll go.
DR. SEUSS
I Can Read with My Eyes Shut!
To learn gives the liveliest pleasure, not only to philosophers but to men in general.
ARISTOTLE
Poetics
Learning makes a man fit company for himself.
LA HARPE
attributed, Day's Collacon
Learning, though it is useful when we know how to make a right use of it, yet, considered as in our own power, and to those who trust to it without seeking a superior guidance ... it is indeed like a sword in a madman's hands, which gives him the more opportunity of hurting himself than others.
JOHN NEWTON
Cardiphonia; or, The Utterance of the Heart
The wisest mind hath something yet to learn.
GEORGE SANTAYANA
Atoms of Thought
Whoso neglects learning in his youth, loses the past and is dead for the future.
EURIPIDES
Phrixus, fragment
He who studies without passion will never become anything more than a pedant.
STEFAN ZWEIG
Confusion of Feelings or Confusion
Learning makes a good man better, and an ill man worse.
JOHN GARTH
attributed, Day's Collacon
Man is but a beast without it: such a glorious god is Learning.
BHARTRHARI
"The Praise of the Wise Man"
He is not likely to learn who is not willing to be taught; for the learner has something to do, as well as the teacher.
BENJAMIN WHICHCOTE
Moral and Religious Aphorisms
Learning is not attained by chance, it must be sought for with ardor and attended to with diligence.
ABIGAIL ADAMS
letter to John Quincy Adams, May 8, 1780
You live and learn. Or you don't live long.
ROBERT A. HEINLEIN
The Notebooks of Lazarus Long
Learning is like a cow of desire. It, like her, yields in all seasons.
CHANAKYA
Vridda-Chanakya
Gie me ae spark o' Nature's fire,
That's a' the learning I desire.
ROBERT BURNS
First Epistle to John Lapraik