Fool Quotes - Page 15

• Oppression makes wise men mad; but the distemper is still the madness of the wise, which is better than the sobriety of fools.

  Edmund Burke

  Wise, Men, Mad

  Edmund Burke, Robert MONTGOMERY (Author of “Satan.”.) (1853). “Edmund Burke: being first principles selected from his writings. With an introductory essay by Robert Montgomery”, p.153

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• For the greatest fool and rascal in creation there is yet a worse condition; and that is, not to know it, but to think himself a respectable man.

  George MacDonald

  Men, Thinking, Creation

  George MacDonald (2015). “THOMAS WINGFOLD, CURATE + PAUL FABER, SURGEON + THERE AND BACK - The Complete Series: The Curate's Awakening, The Lady's Confession & The Baron's Apprenticeship”, p.230, e-artnow

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• People have no right to make fools of themselves, unless they have no relations to blush for them.

  Thomas Chandler Haliburton

  People, Relation

  Thomas Chandler Haliburton (1856). “Wise-saws: Or, Sam Slick in Search of a Wife”, p.185

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• The best thing next to wit is a consciousness that it is not in us; without wit, a man might then know how to behave himself, so as not to appear to be a fool or a coxcomb.

  Jean de la Bruyere

  Men, Might, Next

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• Silence is one great art of conversation. He is not a fool who knows when to hold his tongue; and a person may gain credit for sense, eloquence, wit, who merely says nothing to lessen the opinion which others have of these qualities in themselves.

  William Hazlitt

  Art, Silence, Quality

  William Hazlitt (2015). “Delphi Collected Works of William Hazlitt (Illustrated)”, p.1472, Delphi Classics

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• Anticipated rents, and bills unpaid,
  Force many a shining youth into the shade,
  Not to redeem his time, but his estate,
  And play the fool, but at the cheaper rate.

  William Cowper

  Play, Shining, Debt

  William Cowper (1830). “Poems ... With a sketch of his life and a vindication of his religious principles and character. Third edition, corrected and enlarged. [With a portrait.]”, p.145

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• Let no one expect anything of certainty from astronomy, lest if anyone take as true that which has been constructed for another use, he go away... a bigger fool than when he came to it.

  Bill Vaughan

  Going Away, Use, Astronomy

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• I fancy the character of a poet is in every country the same,--fond of enjoying the present, careless of the future; his conversation that of a man of sense, his actions those of a fool.

  Oliver Goldsmith

  Country, Character, Men

  Oliver Goldsmith (1835). “His Works”, p.241

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• Then might ye see
  Cowls, hoods, and habits with their wearers tost
  And flutter'd into rags; then reliques, beads,
  Indulgences, dispenses, pardons, bulls,
  The sport of winds; all these upwhirl'd aloft
  Fly to the rearward of the world far off
  Into a limbo large and broad, since called
  The paradise of fools.

  John Milton

  Sports, Wind, Rags

  John Milton, “Paradise Lost: Book 03”

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• You can fool people some of the time, but you can't fool them all of the time.

  Aesop

  Honesty, People

  Albert Cullum, Aesop (1972). “Aesop in the afternoon”

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• How often have I not heard a perfectly intelligent female says, in the tone of one clinching an argument, 'Edgar says -- ' And all the time you are perfectly aware that Edgar is a perfect fool.

  Agatha Christie

  Intelligent, Perfect, Tone

  Agatha Christie (1931). “The man in the brown suit”

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• Titles and mottoes to books are like escutcheons and dignities in the hands of a king. The wise sometimes condescend to accept of them; but none but a fool would imagine them of any real importance. We ought to depend upon intrinsic merit, and not the slender helps of the title.

  Oliver Goldsmith

  Wise, Kings, Real

  Oliver Goldsmith (1820). “Essays and The Bee”

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• He was the freeman whom the truth made free;
  Who first of all, the bands of Satan broke;
  Who broke the bands of sin, and for his soul,
  In spite of fools consulted seriously.

  Robert Pollok

  Freedom, Soul, Firsts

  Robert Pollok (1833). “The Course of Time, a Poem: With a Memoir of the Author, an Introductory Notice, a Copious Index, and an Analysis Prefixed to Each Book”, p.74

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• How to fool yourself into feeling younger: When you go to restaurants, always check a coat and a skateboard.

  Joan Rivers

  Feelings, Age, Coats

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• The authority of reason is far more imperious than that of a master; for he who disobeys the one is unhappy, but he who disobeys the other is a fool.

  Blaise Pascal

  Unhappy, Reason, Authority

  Blaise Pascal (1829). “Thoughts on Religion and Other Subjects”, p.263

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• Only the fools are certain and assured.

  Michel de Montaigne

  Wisdom, Certain, Defiance

  Michel de Montaigne (1958). “Complete Essays”, p.111, Stanford University Press

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• Hath fortune dealt thee ill cards? let wisdom make thee a good gamester. In a fair gale, every fool may sail, but wise behavior in a storm commends the wisdom of a pilot; to bear adversity with an equal mind is both the sign and glory of a brave spirit.

  Francis Quarles

  Wise, Adversity, Brave

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• Courage multiplies the chances of success by sometimes making opportunities, and always availing itself of them; and in this sense Fortune may be said to favor fools by those who, however prudent in their opinion, are deficient in valor and enterprise.

  Samuel Taylor Coleridge

  Courage, Opportunity, Prudent

  Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1854). “The Complete Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge: With an Introductory Essay Upon His Philosophical and Theological Opinions”, p.476

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• Devout Christians are destined to be regarded as fools in modern society. We are fools for Christ's sake. We must pray for courage to endure the scorn of the sophisticated world.

  Antonin Scalia

  Christian, Scary, Melting

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• Oh, that [his Thanksgiving Message] is some of Seward's nonsense, and it pleases the fools.

  Abraham Lincoln

  Atheism, Messages, Nonsense

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• A rogue is a roundabout fool.

  Samuel Taylor Coleridge

  Rogues

  Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Henry Nelson Coleridge (1851). “Specimens of the Table Talk of Samuel Taylor Coleridge”, p.11

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• You cannot fool an audience.

  Marian Anderson

  Audience

  Marian Anderson (1956). “My Lord, what a Morning: An Autobiography”, University of Illinois Press

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• The greatest fool is he who thinks he is not one and all others are.

  Baltasar Gracian

  Thinking

  Baltasar Gracian, Baltasar Gracián y Morales (2004). “The Art of Worldly Wisdom”, p.115, Shambhala Publications

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• You know how in football, guys throw defenses, and the defense throws you a look, but the look is not really what it is - it's only made to fool you. It's the same thing with drugs. The drug is only an illusion to draw you in.

  Rick Ross

  Football, Guy, Drug

  Source: www.brownpoliticalreview.org

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• Even in the tragedies, Shakespeare always put in parts for the comic actors because his audience was mixed. He puts in people who talk like aristocrats. He puts in idiots and fools. He puts in certain middle-range characters. And when you go to the Globe, you realize how that all works. The people who paid more sat in seats around the edge. Everybody else paid a penny. They put it into a tin box - that's why we call it the "box office." They stood in the pit, but they were very close, so when Hamlet was doing his soliloquy, it was addressed to you, the audience - right there.

  Margaret Atwood

  Character, People, Office

  "Margaret Atwood Remixes Shakespeare’s “The Tempest” as a Prison Drama". Interview With Maddie Oatman, www.motherjones.com. September/October 2016.

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