Epictetus Quotes

I don't feel it incumbent on me to make sense of everything.

Whoever believes he knows why everything is as it is has hold of nothing.

For only when I err do I get away from what I know and what I understand. If "truth" were what I can understand, it would end up being but a small truth, my-sized. Truth must reside precisely in what I shall never understand.

Knowledge does not corrupt, unless it is arrogant; but then it is not true knowledge.

To ask for an explanation is to explain the obscure by the more obscure.

To be proud of knowledge is to be blind with light.

Don't express your ideas too clearly. Most people think little of what they understand, and venerate what they do not.

I begin to see an object when I cease to understand it.

One truth that I know for sure, for me anyway, is that the more you know, the more you realize that you don't know.

They understand but a little who understand only what can be explained.

Pride is less ashamed of being ignorant, than of being instructed, and she looks too high to find that, which very often lies beneath her.

Telling someone something he does not understand is pointless, even if you add that he will not be able to understand it.

As far as I'm concerned, if something is so complicated that you can't explain it in 10 seconds, then it's probably not worth knowing anyway.

You could know the what of something forever and never discover the why.

Strange about learning; the farther I go the more I see that I never knew even existed. A short while ago I foolishly thought I could learn everything - all the knowledge in the world. Now I hope only to be able to know of its existence, and to understand one grain of it. Is there time?

The light of the understanding, humility kindleth and pride covereth.

Unexplained, obscure matters are regarded as more important than explained, clear ones.

You are so proud of your intelligence," said the master. "You are like a like a condemned man, proud of the vastness of his prison cell.

It's good to slowly come to the realization that you understand nothing.

I know nothing, because I know too much, and understand not nearly enough and never will.

It's not a silly question if you can't answer it.

The longer I live, the more uninformed I feel. Only the young have an explanation for everything.

Answers are a perilous grip on the universe. They can appear sensible yet explain nothing.

There is but a slight difference between the man who may be said to know nothing and him who thinks he knows everything.

Quid est ergo tempus? Si nemo ex me quaerat, scio; si quaerenti explicare velim, nescio. What, then, is time? I know well enough what it is, provided that nobodyasksme; but if Iamasked what it is and try to explain, I am baffled.