The aim of the wise is not to secure pleasure, but to avoid pain.
Aristotle

The wise man does not expose himself needlessly to danger, since there are few things for which he cares sufficiently; but he is willing, in great crises, to give even his life - knowing that under certain conditions it is not worthwhile to live.
Aristotle

All this worldly wisdom was once the unamiable heresy of some wise man.
Henry David Thoreau

I have always been regretting that I was not as wise as the day I was born.
Henry David Thoreau

He who knows others is wise. He who knows himself is enlightened.
Lao Tzu

The wise man does not lay up his own treasures. The more he gives to others, the more he has for his own.
Lao Tzu

Now the reason the enlightened prince and the wise general conquer the enemy whenever they move and their achievements surpass those of ordinary men is foreknowledge.
Sun Tzu

It is only the enlightened ruler and the wise general who will use the highest intelligence of the army for the purposes of spying, and thereby they achieve great results.
Sun Tzu

The skilful employer of men will employ the wise man, the brave man, the covetous man, and the stupid man.
Sun Tzu

The well bred contradict other people. The wise contradict themselves.
Oscar Wilde

I have no faith in human perfectability. I think that human exertion will have no appreciable effect upon humanity. Man is now only more active - not more happy - nor more wise, than he was 6000 years ago.
Edgar Allan Poe

If you young fellows were wise, the devil couldn't do anything to you, but since you aren't wise, you need us who are old.
Martin Luther

Recently I heard a 'wise guy' story that I had a party at my home for twenty-five men. It's an interesting story, but I don't know twenty-five men I'd want to invite ta a party.
Joan Crawford

The shallow consider liberty a release from all law, from every constraint. The wise man sees in it, on the contrary, the potent Law of Laws.
Walt Whitman

A hero is born among a hundred, a wise man is found among a thousand, but an accomplished one might not be found even among a hundred thousand men.
Plato

He was a wise man who invented beer.
Plato

Wise men speak because they have something to say; Fools because they have to say something.
Plato

We ought to fly away from earth to heaven as quickly as we can; and to fly away is to become like God, as far as this is possible; and to become like him is to become holy, just, and wise.
Plato

Love is the joy of the good, the wonder of the wise, the amazement of the Gods.
Plato

The punishment which the wise suffer who refuse to take part in the government, is to live under the government of worse men.
Plato