quotations about fools
The greatest fool may ask more than the wisest man can answer.
CHARLES CALEB COLTON
Lacon
Men may live fools, but fools they cannot die.
EDWARD YOUNG
Night Thoughts
Fools may our scorn, not envy raise,
For envy is a kind of praise.
JOHN GAY
Fables
There are two indiscretions that generally distinguish fools: a readiness to report whatever they hear, and a practice of communicating with secrecy what is commonly understood.
NORMAN MACDONALD
Maxims and Moral Reflections
The learned Fool writes his Nonsense in better Language than the unlearned; but still 'tis Nonsense.
BENJAMIN FRANKLIN
Poor Richard's Almanack, 1754
If at first you don’t succeed, try again. Then quit. No use being a damn fool about it.
W.C. FIELDS
Sometimes one likes foolish people for their folly, better than wise people for their wisdom.
ELIZABETH GASKELL
Wives and Daughters
The angels must tremble when a fool is in the right.
ABRAHAM MILLER
Unmoral Maxims
Fine clothes may disguise, but silly words will disclose a fool.
AESOP
Aesop's Fables
When a fool dies there is much shedding of tears in the land whither he is bound.
ABRAHAM MILLER
Unmoral Maxims
The difference between a wise and foolish man is this--the former sees much, thinks much, and speaks little; but the latter speaks more than he either sees or thinks.
WILLIAM SCOTT DOWNEY
Proverbs
The cleverest of all, in my opinion, is the man who calls himself a fool at least once a month.
FYODOR DOSTOEVSKY
Bobok
O! I am Fortune's fool.
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE
Romeo and Juliet
Because other people are fools, must you be so too?
MARCUS AURELIUS
Meditations
He must be a thorough fool who can learn nothing from his own folly.
ELIZA COOK
Diamond Dust
Fools always lead a mob.
PAUL H. YARBROUGH
"A Congress of Fools", Communities Digital News, May 6, 2019
Fashion! -- a word which knaves and fools may use,
Their knavery and folly to excuse.
CHARLES CHURCHILL
The Rosciad
We must often consider, not what the wise will think, but what the foolish will be sure to say.
ARTHUR HELPS
Thoughts in the Cloister and the Crowd
Ten gods cannot change the opinion of one fool, especially if another fool agrees with him.
ABRAHAM MILLER
Unmoral Maxims
Fools, when their roof-tree falls, think it doomsday.
JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL
"The Voyage to Vinland"