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Accurate reading on a wide range of subjects makes the scholar; careful selection of the better makes the saint.

— John of Salisbury Policraticus (1159)

Exquisita lectio singulorum, doctissimum; cauta electio meliorum, optimum facit.

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Notes from Wikiquote

Bk. 7, ch. 10

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More quotes by John of Salisbury

Between a tyrant and a prince there is this single or chief difference, that the latter obeys the law and rules the people by its dictates, accounting himself as but their servant.

Policraticus (1159)

A man is free in proportion to the measure of his virtues, and the extent to which he is free determines what his virtues can accomplish.

Policraticus (1159)

Bernard of Chartres used to say that we were like dwarfs seated on the shoulders of giants. If we see more and further than they, it is not due to our own clear eyes or tall bodies, but because we are raised on high and upborne by their gigantic bigness.

Metalogicon (1159)

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Reading maketh a full man; conference a ready man; and writing an exact man.

Francis Bacon Meditationes sacræ (1597)

It is not in the books of the Philosophers, but in the religious symbolism of the Ancients, that we must look for the footprints of Science, and re-discover the Mysteries of Knowledge.

Albert Pike Morals and Dogma of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry (1871)

There is more than one way to burn a book. And the world is full of people running about with lit matches.

Ray Bradbury Fahrenheit 451 (1953)

People say that life is the thing, but I prefer reading.

Logan Pearsall Smith Afterthoughts (1931)

Attribution

Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: John of Salisbury (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.