Wandering through the wise words of the brilliant minds who came before us
With nothing to do, I often look for things to read.
Recently, I sat down with a book titled, “The Most Brilliant Thoughts of All Time (In two lines or less)," as edited by John M. Shanahan.
I enjoyed a small glass of German sweet wine to nourish my intellect on this voyage.
Since I know many of my readers, including my critics, often search for brilliant thoughts, I thought I would share a few of my favorites.
Buckle up, don’t get offended, but try to absorb a few of these lines for your brain growth, if you like. Some observant people shared them for our consumption and knowledge.
Let’s try a few of them out:
"Never engage in a battle of wits with an unarmed person." — Mark Twain
I always try to remember this one.
"Some circumstantial evidence is very strong, as when you find a trout in milk." — Henry David Thoreau
I ponder this one when I listen to some experts at times.
"Women do not find it difficult to behave like men, but they often find it difficult to behave like gentlemen." — Sir Compton McKensie
I was thinking myself of a few examples in Congress these days.
"A committee of one gets things done." — Joe Ryan
"Blame-all and Praise-all are two blockheads." — Benjamin Franklin
"Injustice is relatively easy to bear; it is justice that hurts." — H.L. Mencken
"The friendship that can cease has never been real." — St. Jerome
"No one can make you feel inferior without your consent." — Eleanor Roosevelt
You speak so honorably of those folk from Dargan, Eleanor.
"Rudeness is the weak man’s imitation of strength." — Eric Hoffer
"Never tell people how to do things. Tell them what to do, and they will surprise you with their ingenuity." — George Patton
"An army of sheep led by a lion would defeat an army of lions led by a sheep." — Arab proverb
"When there is an income tax, the just will pay more and the unjust less." — Plato
"When there is no middle class, and the poor greatly exceed in number, troubles arise, and the state soon comes to an end." — Aristotle
Where have all the philosophers gone?
"A liberal is a man who will give away everything he doesn’t own." — Frank Dane
"We hang the petty thieves and appoint the great ones to public office." — Aesop
"One of the oldest human needs is having someone to wonder where you are when you don’t come home at night." — Margaret Mead
"Ridicule often checks what is absurd, and fully as often smothers that which is noble." — Sir Walter Scott
Taking off:What's next for the Hagerstown Regional Airport? We're about to find out
"Saint: n. A dead sinner revised and edited." — Ambrose Bierce
Some of these thoughts are quite provocative, and some deserve reading more than once.
"Never explain. Your friends do not need it and your enemies will not believe it anyway." — Elbert Hubbard
"All the trouble in the world is due to the fact that man cannot sit still in a room." — Blaise Pascal
Some of these little two liners are filled with much wisdom and observations of some great thinkers. They weave a web of thoughts that could make one’s thinking improve in many new directions if embraced.
For those who don’t read or think, they are, however, a mere speck of dust in the wind that visits the eye but never arouses the brain.
Want a few more?
"Great blunders are often made, like large ropes, of a multitude of fibers." — Victor Hugo
Remembering here Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq and more wars than I choose to count.
"A conservative is a man with two perfectly good legs, who, however, has never learned to walk forward." — Franklin D. Roosevelt
"Wait for the wisest of all counselors — time." — Pericles
"The unexamined life is not worth living." — Socrates
How many times, truthfully, have you attempted to examine your life? There are many things to study, really. Those aspects of good and evil, those emotions of tears and smiles, injustice and justice, love and hate, and many others.
Some say that wisdom arrives at the end. For sure it doesn’t arrive at the beginning. Do you ever seek out wisdom or do you continuously swim in the pool of ignorance for most of your walk?
Reading is a source never embraced by enough people. Thinking, too, is an element of one’s evolution.
How far has humanity traveled on this dusty road of life?
Can you see the sign post up ahead?
"Death twitches my ear. 'Live,' he says, ‘I am coming.’” — Virgil
Pete Waters is a Sharpsburg resident who writes for The Herald-Mail.
This article originally appeared on The Herald-Mail: Columnist explores quotes from famous people
