The denser the ignorance, the more enlightened it thinks itself to be.
Knowledge Quotes
Francis Bacon, Shakespeare, John Locke, Samuel Johnson and Einstein are all near the top, which gives the page its character: mostly people who thought about how we know things, rather than about how to feel clever. Johnson gives the most useful single line, in Boswell’s Life (1791): “Knowledge is of two kinds. We know a subject ourselves, or we know where we can find information upon it.” Wittgenstein, in On Certainty (1969), says that knowledge is in the end based on acknowledgement.
A lot of the quotes people look for here are flagged. “As for me, all I know is that I know nothing” is credited to Socrates; see the note on the Wisdom page. “Contempt prior to investigation” is credited to Einstein, and a line about putting the Lord at every turn in the refuge of a miracle is credited to Galileo.
A name made great is a name destroyed. He who does not increase his knowledge decreases it.
From ignorance our comfort flows.
The only wretched are the wise.
There's lots of people—this town wouldn't hold them;
Who don't know much excepting what's told them.
Man's knowledge, save before his fellow man,
Is ignorance—his widest wisdom folly.
To be ignorant of one's ignorance is the malady of the ignorant.
Knowledge makes people special. Knowledge enriches life itself.
A man who knows how little he knows is well, a man who knows how much he knows is sick.
There is nothing so dangerous as an ignorant and frightened man.
To be conscious that you are ignorant is a great step to knowledge.