How is it possible to expect that mankind will take advice when they will not so much as take warning.
Jonathan SwiftRead
No man was ever so completely skilled in the conduct of life, as not to receive new information from age and experience.
Interpretation
Everyone can learn and grow from their experiences regardless of their expertise.
This quote emphasizes that no matter how knowledgeable or skilled a person becomes, there is always room for growth and learning through the experiences that come with aging. It suggests that the journey of life is a continuous process of gaining wisdom and understanding as we encounter new situations and information.
In practice
During a motivational speech about personal development.
How is it possible to expect that mankind will take advice when they will not so much as take warning.
What vexes me most is, that my female friends, who could bear me very well a dozen years ago, have now forsaken me, although I am not so old in proportion to them as I formerly was: which I can prove by arithmetic, for then I was double their age, which now I am not. Letter to Alexander Pope. 7 Feb. 1736.
This is every cook's opinion - _x000D_ no savory dish without an onion, _x000D_ but lest your kissing should be spoiled _x000D_ your onions must be fully boiled.
The bulk of mankind is as well equipped for flying as thinking.
This single Stick, which you now behold ingloriously lying in that neglected Corner, I once knew in a flourishing State in a Forest: It was full of Sap, full of Leaves, and full of Boughs: But now, in vain does the busy Art of Man pretend to vie with Nature, by tying that withered Bundle of Twigs to its sapless Trunk: It is at best but the Reverse of what it was; a Tree turned upside down, the Branches on the Earth, and the Root in the Air.
I'm as old as my tongue and a little older than my teeth.
I never guess. It is a shocking habit destructive to the logical faculty.
Most people think of peace as a state of Nothing Bad Happening, or Nothing Much Happening. Yet if peace is to overtake us and make us the gift of serenity and well-being, it will have to be the state of Something Good Happening.
The wise have mastered body, word, and mind. They are the true masters.
Wealth and rank are what men desire, but unless they be obtained in the right way they may not be possessed. Poverty and obscurity are what men detest; but unless prosperity be brought about in the right way, they are not to be abandoned.
How often it is that a small action becomes great by its intention. And how often it is that a great action becomes small by its intention.
Men who know themselves are no longer fools. They stand on the threshold of the door of Wisdom.
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