Dunces Quotes

• The basic proposal of the new education is to be that dunces and idlers must not be made to feel inferior to intelligent and industrious pupils. That would be 'undemocratic.

  C. S. Lewis

  Education, Intelligent, Would Be

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• In a word, we may reasonably hope for the virtual abolition of education when I'm as good as you has fully had its way. All incentives to learn and all penalties for not learning will vanish.The few who might want to learn will be prevented; who are they to overtop their fellows? And anyway the teachers-or should I say, nurses?-will be far too busy reassuring the dunces and patting them on the back to waste any time on real teaching. We shall no longer have to plan and toil to spread imperturable conceit and incurable ignorance among men. The little vermin themselves will do it for us.

  C. S. Lewis

  Teacher, Real, Teaching

  C. S. LEWIS (1961). “The Screwtape Letters & Screwtape Proposes a Toast”

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• When a true genius appears, you can know him by this sign: that all the dunces are in a confederacy against him.

  Jonathan Swift

  Funny, Education, Truth

  "Biography/ Personal Quotes". www.imdb.com.

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• The political arena leaves one no alternative, one must either be a dunce or a rogue.

  Emma Goldman

  Political, Alternatives, Politics

  Emma Goldman (2015). “Anarchism: Top Crime Collections”, p.36, 谷月社

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• A wit with dunces, and a dunce with wits.

  Alexander Pope

  Sarcastic, Wit

  'The Dunciad' (1742) bk. 4, l. 90

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• When my brain begins to reel from my literary labors, I make an occasional cheese dip.

  John Kennedy Toole

  Brain, Cheese, Dip

  "A Confederacy of Dunces".

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• Leaving New Orleans also frightened me considerably. Outside of the city limits the heart of darkness, the true wasteland begins.

  John Kennedy Toole

  Heart, New Orleans, Cities

  John Kennedy Toole (2004). “A Confederacy of Dunces”, p.15, LSU Press

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• When Fortuna spins you downward, go out to a movie and get more out of life.

  John Kennedy Toole

  Fortuna

  John Kennedy Toole (2004). “A Confederacy of Dunces”, p.82, LSU Press

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• How much a dunce that has been sent to roam, excels a dunce that has been kept at home.

  William Cowper

  Home, Has Beens

  'The Progress of Error' (1782) l. 415

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• Not all celebrities are dunces.

  Carroll O'Connor

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• Yeah, I think A Confederacy of Dunces is probably the perfect New Orleans book.

  Poppy Z. Brite

  Book, Thinking, New Orleans

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• I'm not eager to jump into marriage again. I'm in the corner right now, wearing my dunce cap. That area is obviously a nightmare.

  Lisa Marie Presley

  Marriage, Sunglasses, Nightmare

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• with the breakdown of the medieval system, the gods of chaos, lunacy, and bad taste gained ascendancy.

  John Kennedy Toole

  Taste, Chaos, Medieval

  John Kennedy Toole (2004). “A Confederacy of Dunces”, p.41, LSU Press

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• The defects of great men are the consolation of the dunces.

  Isaac D'Israeli

  Men, Consolation, Defects

  "Essay on the Literary Character" by Isaac D'Israeli, Preface p. xxix, and Vol. I, p. 187, 1795.

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• Apparently I lack some particular perversion which today's employer is seeking.

  John Kennedy Toole

  Work, Today, Employers

  John Kennedy Toole (2004). “A Confederacy of Dunces”, p.237, LSU Press

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• I am at the moment writing a lengthy indictment against our century. When my brain begins to reel from my literary labors, I make an occasional cheese dip.

  John Kennedy Toole

  Food, Writing, Cheesy

  John Kennedy Toole (2004). “A Confederacy of Dunces”, p.9, LSU Press

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• Veneration of Mark Twain is one of the roots of our current intellectual stalemate.

  John Kennedy Toole

  Roots, Intellectual, Odor

  John Kennedy Toole (2004). “A Confederacy of Dunces”, p.70, LSU Press

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• Is my paranoia getting completely out of hand, or are you mongoloids really talking about me?

  John Kennedy Toole

  Attitude, Hands, Talking

  John Kennedy Toole (1980). “A Confederacy of Dunces”, p.89, Dubois Publishing

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• A firm rule must be imposed upon our nation before it destroys itself. The United States needs some theology and geometry, some taste and decency. I suspect that we are teetering on the edge of the abyss.

  John Kennedy Toole

  United States, Needs, Taste

  John Kennedy Toole (1980). “A Confederacy of Dunces”, p.23, Dubois Publishing

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• Slang is a foul pool at which every dunce fills his bucket, and then sets up as a fountain.

  Ambrose Bierce

  Buckets, Pool, Fountain

  Ambrose Bierce (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Ambrose Bierce (Illustrated)”, p.1219, Delphi Classics

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• Book - Learning : The dunce's derisive term for all knowledge that transcends his own impertinent ignorance.

  Ambrose Bierce

  Book, Ignorance, Knowledge

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• Few human creatures would consent to be changed into any of the lower animals for a promise of the fullest allowance of a beast's pleasures; no intelligent human being would consent to be a fool, no instructed person would be an ignoramus, no person of feeling and conscience would be selfish and base, even though they should be persuaded that the fool, the dunce, or the rascal is better satisfied with his lot than they are with theirs.

  John Stuart Mill

  Selfish, Animal, Intelligent

  John Stuart Mill, Jeremy Bentham, John Troyer (2003). “The Classical Utilitarians: Bentham and Mill”, p.101, Hackett Publishing

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• The flat-brimmed cap is the modern day dunce cap.

  Daniel Tosh

  Modern, Caps, Flats

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• The use of proverbs is characteristic of an unlettered people. They are invaluable treasures to dunces with good memories.

  John Hay

  Memories, People, Use

  John Hay (1897). “Castilian Days”

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• The ears, which master the face of a dunce, are that part of the head which most publishes stupidity.

  Alexander Theroux

  Stupidity, Faces, Ears

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