John Adams Quotes

In the long run of history, the censor and the inquisitor have always lost. The only sure weapon against bad ideas is better ideas. The source of better ideas is wisdom. The surest path to wisdom is a liberal education.

The learned man knows that he is ignorant.

I think well-read people - the world is open to them.

Our understanding of the world around us is constantly being redefined and expanded, and so therefore, it is wiser to be passionate about seeking for truth than knowing it.

My mother was a dominant force in my life. She had a very specific idea about education, which was: you should know everything about everything. It was quite simple. There was no exclusivity, and there really was no judgment.

I hate the idea of sheltering kids from challenging books. It's just another form of conservative fear that promotes ignorance more than anything else.

Being ignorant is not so much a shame, as being unwilling to learn.

Where the press is free and every man able to read, all is safe.

Education was the most important value in our home when I was growing up. People don't always realize that my parents shared a sense of intellectual curiosity and a love of reading and of history.

I'm not quite pompous enough to think of myself as an educator or a man capable of definitive refutation of falsehoods.

It is only the ignorant who despise education.

It's only through listening that you learn, and I never want to stop learning.

Contrary to current cynicism about past golden ages, the abstraction known as 'the intelligent layperson' does exist - in the form of millions of folks with a passionate commitment to continuous learning.

Some people drink from the fountain of knowledge, others just gargle.

I believe in a free market of ideas and not shying away from debate.

There are worse crimes than burning books. One of them is not reading them.

I never heard of anyone who was really literate or who ever really loved books who wanted to suppress any of them.

A wise system of education will at last teach us how little man yet knows, how much he has still to learn.

The long run of history, the censor and the inquisitor have always lost. The only weapon against bad ideas is better ideas.

The University is not engaged in making ideas safe for students. It is engaged in making students safe for ideas. Thus it permits the freest expression of views before students, trusting to their good sense in passing judgment on these views. Only in this way can it best serve American democracy.

With a library you are free, not confined by temporary political climates. It is the most democratic of institutions because no one — but no one at all — can tell you what to read and when and how.

To be conscious that you are ignorant is a great step to knowledge.

Doubt is the origin of wisdom.

All I claim, all I plead for, is liberty of thought and expression. That is all. I do not pretend to tell what is absolutely true, but what I think is true. I do not pretend to tell all the truth..

You may be able to read Bernard Shaw's plays, you may be able to quote Shakespeare or Voltaire or some new philosopher; but if you in yourself are not intelligent, if you are not creative, what is the point of this education?