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Erudition can produce foliage without bearing fruit.
Georg C. Lichtenberg
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Georg C. Lichtenberg
Age: 56 †
Born: 1742
Born: July 1
Died: 1799
Died: February 24
Astronomer
French Moralist
Mathematician
Philosopher
Physicist
Scientist
University Teacher
Writer
København
Produce
Without
Erudition
Foliage
Bearing
Fruit
More quotes by Georg C. Lichtenberg
It is certainly not a matter of indifference whether I learn something without effort or finally arrive at it myself through my system of thought. In the latter case everything has roots, in the former it is merely superficial.
Georg C. Lichtenberg
Ambition and suspicion always go together.
Georg C. Lichtenberg
They do not think, therefore they are not.
Georg C. Lichtenberg
That man is the noblest creature may also be inferred from the fact that no other creature has yet contested this claim.
Georg C. Lichtenberg
One's first step in wisdom is to question everything - and one's last is to come to terms with everything.
Georg C. Lichtenberg
We have to believe that everything has a cause, as the spider spins its web in order to catch flies. But it does this before it knows there are such things as flies.
Georg C. Lichtenberg
Prejudices are so to speak the mechanical instincts of men: through their prejudices they do without any effort many things they would find too difficult to think through to the point of resolving to do them.
Georg C. Lichtenberg
The ordinary man is ruined by the flesh lusting against the spirit the scholar by the spirit lusting too much against the flesh.
Georg C. Lichtenberg
A clever child brought up with a foolish one can itself become foolish. Man is so perfectible and corruptible he can become a fool through good sense.
Georg C. Lichtenberg
The celebrated painter Gainsborough got as much pleasure from seeing violins as from hearing them.
Georg C. Lichtenberg
Man is a masterpiece of creation, if only because no amount of determinism can prevent him from believing that he acts as a free being.
Georg C. Lichtenberg
Libraries can in general be too narrow or too wide for the soul.
Georg C. Lichtenberg
One has to do something new in order to see something new.
Georg C. Lichtenberg
Those who have racked their brains to discover new proofs have perhaps been induced to do so by a compulsion they could not quite explain to themselves. Instead of giving us their new proofs they should have explained to us the motivation that constrained them to search for them.
Georg C. Lichtenberg
A man has virtues enough if he deserves pardon for his faults on account of them.
Georg C. Lichtenberg
A book is a mirror: if an ape looks into it an apostle is hardly likely to look out.
Georg C. Lichtenberg
Diogenes, filthily attired, paced across the splendid carpets in Plato's dwelling. Thus, said he, do I trample on the pride of Plato. Yes, Plato replied, but only with another kind of pride.
Georg C. Lichtenberg
There were honest people long before there were Christians and there are, God be praised, still honest people where there are no Christians. It could therefore easily be possible that people are Christians because true Christianity corresponds to what they would have been even if Christianity did not exist.
Georg C. Lichtenberg
Astronomy is perhaps the science whose discoveries owe least to chance, in which human understanding appears in its whole magnitude, and through which man can best learn how small he is.
Georg C. Lichtenberg
If it were true what in the end would be gained? Nothing but another truth. Is this such a mighty advantage? We have enough old truths still to digest, and even these we would be quite unable to endure if we did not sometimes flavor them with lies.
Georg C. Lichtenberg
