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Learning Quotes

A short list with no flagged entries. Shakespeare, John Gay, Goldsmith, Pope and Bacon each have a few. Bacon’s Meditationes Sacræ (1597) is the best-known: reading maketh a full man, conference a ready man, and writing an exact man. Samuel Johnson’s The Vanity of Human Wishes (1749) urges the reader to pause a while from learning to be wise. Bierce’s Devil’s Dictionary (1911) defines learning as the kind of ignorance distinguishing the studious.

For more on teaching and schools, see Education.

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The one important thing I have learned over the years is the difference between taking one's work seriously and taking one's self seriously. The first is imperative and the second is disastrous.

Margot Fonteyn Simpson's Contemporary Quotations‎ (1988)

Entertainment and learning are not opposites; entertainment may be the most effective mode of learning.

Herbert Marcuse One-Dimensional Man (1964)

He can't paint eyes. He couldn't learn to paint at all.

Margaret Keane

I don't know what's the matter with people: they don't learn by understanding; they learn by some other way — by rote or something. Their knowledge is so fragile!

Richard Feynman Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman! (1985)

One does not learn how to die by killing others.

François-René de Chateaubriand Mémoires d'outre-tombe (1848)

You can get help from teachers, but you are going to have to learn a lot by yourself, sitting alone in a room.

Dr. Seuss

You don't understand anything until you learn it more than one way.

Marvin Minsky In Managing an Information Security and Privacy Awareness and Training Program (2005)

The ability to learn faster than competitors may be the only sustainable competitive advantage.

Arie de Geus

If you hide your ignorance, no one will hit you, and you'll never learn.

Ray Bradbury Fahrenheit 451 (1953)

A man spends the first year of his life learning that he ends at his own skin, and the rest of his life learning that he doesn't.

Saul Gorn

While we spoke of many things
Fools and kings
This he said to me:
"The greatest thing you'll ever learn
Is just to love and be loved in return."

Eden ahbez Nature Boy (1948)

Learning and enjoyment are the secret to a fulfilled life. Learning without enjoyment wears you down, enjoyment without learning dulls you.

Richard David Precht

He who laughs most, learns best.

John Cleese Creating Emotionally Safe Schools: A Guide for Educators and Parents‎ (2001)

Everyone has a belief system, B.S., the trick is to learn not to take anyone's B.S. too seriously, especially your own.

Robert Anton Wilson Reality Is What You Can Get Away With (1993)

Whenever we proceed from the known into the unknown we may hope to understand, but we may have to learn at the same time a new meaning of the word "understanding."

Werner Heisenberg Physics and Philosophy (1958)

A writer is, after all, only half his book. The other half is the reader and from the reader the writer learns.

P. L. Travers

Disneyland is often called a magic kingdom because it combines fantasy and history, adventure and learning, together with every variety of recreation and fun designed to appeal to everyone.

Walt Disney EPCOT promotional film (1966)

It's a mistake not to give people a chance to learn to depend on themselves while they are young.

Walt Disney EPCOT promotional film (1966)

What I look for in a friend is someone who's different from me. The more different the person is, the more I'll learn from him. The more he'll come up with surprising takes on ideas and things and situations.

Samuel R. Delany The Mad Man (1994)

Learning is not doing; it is reflecting on doing. T. S. Eliot writes in one of his poems, “We had the experience but missed the meaning.” Reflection is about getting the meaning.

Henry Mintzberg Managers Not MBAs (2005)

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