Whereas I formerly believed it to be my bounden duty to call others to order, I must now admit that I need calling to order myself, and that I would do better to set my own house to rights first.
Carl Jung (1875-1961) Swiss psychologist
“The Spiritual Problem of Modern Man,” ¶ 162 (1928)
(Source)
Quotations about:
self-correction
Note not all quotations have been tagged, so Search may find additional quotes on this topic.
The greatest of sages can commit one mistake, but not two; he may fall into error, but he doesn’t lie down and make his home there.
[En un descuido puede caer el mayor sabio, pero en dos no; y de paso, que no de asiento.]
Baltasar Gracián y Morales (1601-1658) Spanish Jesuit priest, writer, philosopher
The Art of Worldly Wisdom [Oráculo Manual y Arte de Prudencia], § 214 (1647) [tr. Maurer (1992)]
(Source)
(Source (Spanish)). Alternate translations:
The wisest man may very well fail once, but not twice; transiently, and by inadvertency, but not deliberately.
[Flesher ed. (1685)]
A wise man may make one slip but never two, and that only in running, not while standing still.
[tr. Jacobs (1892)]
The wisest of men may slip once, but not twice, and that only by chance, and not by design.
[tr. Fischer (1937)]
It is this right, the right to err politically, which keeps us strong as a Nation. For no number of laws against communism can have as much effect as the personal conviction which comes from having heard its arguments and rejected them, or from having once accepted its tenets and later recognized their worthlessness.
Hugo Black (1886-1971) American politician and jurist, US Supreme Court Justice (1937-71)
Barenblatt v. United States, 360 U.S. 109, 144 (1959) [dissent]
(Source)
Failings of the intelligence are incorrigible since those who do not know do not know themselves and cannot therefore seek what they lack.
[Achaques de necedad son irremediables, que como los ignorantes no se conocen, tampoco buscan lo que les falta.]
Baltasar Gracián y Morales (1601-1658) Spanish Jesuit priest, writer, philosopher
The Art of Worldly Wisdom [Oráculo Manual y Arte de Prudencia], § 176 (1647) [tr. Jacobs (1892)]
(Source)
(Source (Spanish)). Alternate translation:
Because the ignorant do not know themselves, they never look for what they are lacking.
[tr. Maurer (1992)]
We should only endeavor to think and speak correctly ourselves, without wishing to bring others over to our taste and opinions; this would be too great an undertaking.
[Il faut chercher seulement à penser et à parler juste, sans vouloir amener les autres à notre goût et à nos sentiments; c’est une trop grande entreprise.]
Jean de La Bruyère (1645-1696) French essayist, moralist
Les Caractères, ch. 1 “Of Works of the Mind [Des ouvrages de l’esprit],” #2 (1688) [tr. Van Laun (1885)]
(Source)
It is only an error of judgment to make a mistake, but it argues an infirmity of character to adhere to it when discovered.
Christian Nestell Bovee (1820-1904) American epigrammatist, writer, publisher
Intuitions and Summaries of Thought, Vol. 2 (1862)
(Source)
It is better to correct your own faults than those of another.
[Κρέσσον τὰ οἰκήϊα ἐλέγχειν ἁμαρτήματα ἢ τὰ ὀθνεῖα.]
Democritus (c. 460 BC - c. 370 BC) Greek philosopher
Frag. 60 (Diels) [tr. Bakewell (1907)]
(Source)
Original Greek. Diels cites this as "Fragment 60, (114 N.) DEMOKRATES. 25"; collected in Joannes Stobaeus (Stobaios) Anthologium III, 13, 46. Bakewell lists this under "The Golden Sayings of Democritus." Freeman notes this as one of the Gnômae, from a collection called "Maxims of Democratês," but because Stobaeus quotes many of these as "Maxims of Democritus," they are generally attributed to the latter.
Alternate translations:
- "It is better to examine one's own faults than those of others." [tr. Freeman (1948)]
- "It is better to examine your own mistakes than those of others." [tr. Barnes (1987)]
- "It is better to rebuke familiar faults than foreign ones." [tr. @sententiq (2018)]
- "Rather examine your own faults than those of others." [Source]
No matter how far you have gone on the wrong road, turn back.
(Other Authors and Sources)
Turkish proverb
All things […] are best to those who know no better.
Samuel Butler (1835-1902) English novelist, satirist, scholar
“Ignorance”
(Source)
Full passage:The less Judgment any Man ha's the Better he is perswaded of his owne abilities, because he is not capable of understanding anything beyond it, and all things how mean so ever, are best to those who know no better: for beside the naturall affection that he has for himself, which go's very farre, the less he is able to improve and mend his Judgment, the higher value he sets upon it, and can no more correct his own false opinions, when he is at his height, than outgrow his own Stature.
No government is perfect. One of the chief virtues of a democracy, however, is that its defects are always visible and under democratic processes can be pointed out and corrected.
Harry S Truman (1884-1972) US President (1945-1953)
Speech, Joint Session of the US Congress (12 Mar 1947)
(Source)
