Benjamin Disraeli Quotes

The philosophy of the wisest man that ever existed, is mainly derived from the act of introspection.

Now that I know that I am no wiser than anyone else, does this wisdom make me wiser?

One can only become a philosopher, but not be one. As one believes he is a philosopher, he stops being one.

The object of studying philosophy is to know one's own mind, not other people's.

If I am fool, it is, at least, a doubting one; and I envy no one the certainty of his self-approved wisdom.

There's nothing wrong with being shallow as long as you're insightful about it.

I don't necessarily agree with everything I say.

No one's policing their own minds more than an author. You spend a lot of time in your own head analysing what you think about things, and a philosophy comes.

The well bred contradict other people. The wise contradict themselves.

Whenever people agree with me I always feel I must be wrong.

I have opinions of my own—strong opinions—but I don’t always agree with them.

I think it's very important to keep in the back of your mind: 'What if I'm wrong?'

Intelligence is silence, truth is being invisible. But what a racket I make in declaring this.

↑ top up position down The fact that I suspect I'm an asshole means I probably am not, because a real asshole doesn't think he's an asshole, does he? Therefore, by realizing that I'm an asshole, I am in fact negating that very realization, am I not? Descartes's Asshole Axiom: I think I am; therefor I'm not one.

I doubt about myself. I think doubts are good in life. The people who don't have doubts I think only two things-arrogance or not intelligence.

The fruitfulness of our lives depends in large measure in our ability to doubt our own words and to question the value of our own work. The man who completely trusts his own estimate of himself is doomed to sterility.

Discourses on humility are a source of pride in the vain and of humility in the humble. So those on scepticism cause believers to affirm. Few men speak humbly of humility, chastely of chastity, few doubtingly of scepticism.

Have I been wrong? Have I been wise to shut my eyes?

The advantages of philosophy? That I am able to hold converse with myself.

The wise man is one who knows what he does not know.

A man who has humility will have acquired in the last reaches of his beliefs the saving doubt of his own certainty.

The point here is ... to be just a little less arrogant. To have just a little critical awareness about myself and my certainties. Because a huge percentage of the stuff that I tend to be automatically certain of is, it turns out, totally wrong and deluded.

Wisest is she who knows she does not know.

This idea is more surely understood by interrogation; WHAT DO I KNOW? which I bear as my motto with the emblem of a pair of scales.

One's first step in wisdom is to question everything - and one's last is to come to terms with everything.