What are wits for unless a man uses them?

Ellis Peters
About This Quote

What are wits for unless a man uses them? When we were children we were told that we should keep our wits about us because without them, we would be helpless and at the mercy of others. What our parents and teachers intended was that we should use our wits to solve problems and prevent mishaps.

Source: The Heretics Apprentice

Some Similar Quotes
  1. You have killed my love. You used to stir my imagination. Now you don't even stir my curiosity. You simply produce no effect. I loved you because you were marvelous, because you had genius and intellect, because you realized the dreams of great poets and... - Oscar Wilde
  2. But spontaneity is not by any means a blind, disorderly urge, a mere power of caprice. A philosophy restricted to the alternatives of conventional language has no way of conceiving an intelligence which does not work according to plan, according to a one-at-a-time order of... - Alan W. Watts
  3. I didn't set out to discover a truth. I was actually sent to the Outer Fringes to conduct a chair census and learn some humility. But the truth inevitably found me, as important truths often do, like a lost thought in need of a mind. - Jasper Fforde
  4. It is not that I'm so smart. But I stay with the questions much longer. - Albert Einstein
  5. It is one thing to be clever and another to be wise. - George R.r. Martin
More Quotes By Ellis Peters
  1. Truth is a hard master, and costly to serve, but it simplifies all problems.
  2. Bitter though it may be to many, Cadfael concluded, there is no substitute for truth, in this or any case.
  3. The trouble with me, he thought unhappily, is that I have been about the world long enough to know that God's plans for us, however infallibly good, may not take the form we expect and demand.
  4. God, nevertheless, required a little help from men, and what he mostly got was hindrance.
  5. Once, I remember, Father Abbot said that our purpose is justice, and with God lies the privilege of mercy. But even God, when he intends mercy, needs tools to his hand.
Related Topics