Prudence Quotes - Page 9

• Prudence in action avails more than wisdom in conception.

  Marcus Tullius Cicero

  Action, Conception

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• Nothing more enhances authority than silence. It is the crowning virtue of the strong, the refuge of the weak, the modesty of the proud, the pride of the humble, the prudence of the wise, and the sense of fools. To speak is to . . . dissipate one's strength; whereas what action demands is concentration. Silence is a necessary preliminary to the ordering of one's thoughts.

  Charles de Gaulle

  Strength, Wise, Strong

  Charles de Gaulle (1960). “The Edge of the Sword”, New York : Criterion Books

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• Cunning is none of the best nor worst qualities; it floats between virtue and vice; there is scarce any exigence where it may not, and perhaps ought not to be supplied by prudence.

  Jean de la Bruyere

  Quality, Vices, May

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• It is by far the safer course to lay [considerations of the future] altogether aside; and to confine our attention wholly to the nature and extent of the powers as they are delineated in the constitution. Everything beyond this, must be left to the prudence and firmness of the people; who, as they will hold the scales in their own hands, it is to be hoped, will always take care to preserve the constitutional equilibrium between the General and State governments.

  Alexander Hamilton

  Government, Hands, People

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• The establishment of our new Government seemed to be the last great experiment for promoting human happiness by reasonable compact in civil society. It was to be, in the first instance, in a considerable degree a government of accommodation as well as a government of Laws. Much was to be done by prudence, much by conciliation, much by firmness.

  George Washington

  Government, Law, Degrees

  George Washington (1852). “The life of General Washington: first president of the United States”, p.176

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• But, you may ask, if the two departments [i.e., federal and state] should claim each the same subject of power, where is the common umpire to decide ultimately between them? In cases of little importance or urgency, the prudence of both parties will keep them aloof from the questionable ground; but if it can neither be avoided nor compromised, a convention of the States must be called to ascribe the doubtful power to that department which they may think best.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Party, Thinking, Umpires

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• There must be in prudence also some master virtue.

  Aristotle

  Virtue, Masters

  Aristotle (1850). “The Nicomachean Ethics of Aristotle: Tr. with Notes, Original & Selected; an Analytical Introduction; and Questions for the Use of Students”, p.162

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• Rashness is the companion of youth, prudence of old age.

  Marcus Tullius Cicero

  Age, Youth, Companion

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• As the excitement of the game increases, prudence is sure to diminish.

  Edward Bulwer-Lytton, 1st Baron Lytton

  Flirting, Games, Excitement

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• Instead of looking at the past, I put myself ahead twenty years and try to look at what I need to do now in order to get there then.

  Diana Ross

  Past, Order, Years

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

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• Even in the era of AIDS, sex raises no unique moral issues at all. Decisions about sex may involve considerations about honesty, concern for others, prudence, and so on, but there is nothing special about sex in this respect, for the same could be said of decisions about driving a car. (In fact, the moral issues raised by driving a car, both from an environmental and from a safety point of view, are much more serious than those raised by sex.)

  Peter Singer

  Sex, Honesty, Unique

  Peter Singer (1993). “Practical Ethics”, p.2, Cambridge University Press

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• We can easily become as much slaves to precaution as we can to fear. Although we can never rivet our fortune so tight as to make it impregnable, we may by our excessive prudence squeeze out of the life that we are guarding so anxiously all the adventurous quality that makes it worth living.

  Randolph Bourne

  Quality, May, Guarding

  Randolph Silliman Bourne (1913). “Youth and Life”

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• In adversity be spirited and firm, and with equal prudence lessen your sail when filled with a too fortunate gale of prosperity.

  Horace

  Adversity, Gale, Prosperity

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• Do not limp before the lame.
  [Old Fr., Ne clochez pas devant les boyteus.]

  Francois Rabelais

  Lame

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• There is no talent so useful toward rising in the world, or which puts men more out of the reach of fortune, than that quality generally possessed by the dullest sort of men, and in common speech called discretion; a species of lower prudence, by the assistance of which, people of the meanest intellectuals, without any other qualification, pass through the world in great tranquillity, and with universal good treatment, neither giving nor taking offence.

  Jonathan Swift

  Men, People, Giving

  Jonathan Swift (1856). “The Works of Jonathan Swift ...: Containing Interesting and Valuable Papers, Not Hitherto Published ... With Memoir of the Author”, p.206

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• If a man in order to shoot a hare, were to discharge thousands of guns on a great moor in all possible directions; if in order to get into a locked room, he were to buy ten thousand casual keys, and try them all; if, in order to have a house, he were to build a town, and leave all the other houses to wind and weather - assuredly no one would call such proceedings purposeful and still less would anyone conjecture behind these proceedings a higher wisdom, unrevealed reasons, and superior prudence.

  J. W. N. Sullivan

  Gun, Men, Order

  J. W. N. Sullivan (2018). “Contemporary Mind - Some Modern Answers”, p.7, Read Books Ltd

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• Can you also, Lucullus, affirm that there is any power united with wisdom and prudence which has made, or, to use your own expression, manufactured man? What sort of a manufacture is that? Where is it exercised? when? why? how?

  Marcus Tullius Cicero

  Men, Expression, Use

  Marcus Tullius Cicero (2014). “Delphi Complete Works of Cicero (Illustrated)”, p.2388, Delphi Classics

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• I hate to see prudence clinging to the green suckers of youth; 'tis like ivy round a sapling, and spoils the growth of the tree.

  Richard Brinsley Sheridan

  Hate, Ivy, Tree

  1777 Sir Oliver Surface. The School for Scandal, act 2, sc.3.

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• It is a great presumption to ascribe our successes to our own management, and not to esteem ourselves upon any blessing, rather as it is the bounty of heaven, than the acquisition of our own prudence.

  Joseph Addison

  Success, Blessing, Heaven

  Joseph Addison, Sir Richard Steele (1822). “The Spectator: with notes and illustrations. In six volumes”, p.283

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• Silence is the sanctuary of prudence.

  Baltasar Gracian

  Silence, Sanctuary, Silence Is

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• But yet they that have no Science , are in better, and nobler condition with their naturall Prudence; than men, that by their mis-reasoning, or by trusting them that reason wrong, fall upon false and absurd generall rules.

  Thomas Hobbes

  Fall, Men, Reason

  Thomas Hobbes, Richard Tuck (1996). “Hobbes: Leviathan: Revised Student Edition”, p.36, Cambridge University Press

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• It is a disgrace to let ignorance and vanity do more with us than prudence and principle.

  Marcus Aurelius

  Ignorance, Vanity, Principles

  Marcus Aurelius (Emperor of Rome) (1887). “The Meditations of Marcus Aurelius”

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• The softest breeze to fairest flowers gives birth: Think not that Prudence dwells in dark abodes, She scans the future with the eye of gods.

  William Wordsworth

  Flower, Eye, Dark

  1837 'At Bologna, In Remembrance of the Late Insurrections: Continued', l.12-14 (published 1842).

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• I think that the principle of the Conservative Party is jealousy of liberty and of the people, only qualified by fear; but I think the principle of the Liberal Party is trust in the people, only qualified by prudence.

  William E. Gladstone

  Party, Thinking, People

  "Gladstone's Conundrums.; The Statesman Answers Sundry Interesting Questions". www.nytimes.com. February 9, 1879.

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• Those authors are to be read at schools that supply most axioms of prudence.

  Samuel Johnson

  School, Axioms

  Samuel Johnson (1810). “The works of the English poets, from Chaucer to Cowper: including the series edited with prefaces, biographical and critical”, p.277

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