“Pedantry crams our heads with learned lumber, and takes out our brains to make room for it.”

— Charles Caleb Colton, Lacon (1820), Vol. II; XX

About Charles Caleb Colton

1780 – 1832

English cleric and writer, author of "Lacon: or, Many Things in Few Words".

“Marriage is a feast where the grace is sometimes better than the dinner.”

“The wisest man may be wiser to-day than he was yesterday, and to-morrow than he is to-day.”

“That writer does the most, who gives his reader the most knowledge, and takes from him the least time.”

“He is a wise man who does not grieve for the things which he has not, but rejoices for those which he has.”

Attribution note: Source disputed or unverified.

“Knowing yourself is the beginning of all wisdom.”

Attribution note: Source disputed or unverified.

“Yesterday I was clever, so I wanted to change the world. Today I am wise, so I am changing myself.”

“He who knows others is wise; he who knows himself is enlightened.”

Attribution note: Source disputed or unverified.

“The man who asks a question is a fool for a minute, the man who does not ask is a fool for life.”

“The truth is rarely pure and never simple.”