Sunday, July 11, 2021 – Total Ignorance
Ignorance is preferable to error, and he is less remote from the truth who believes nothing than he who believes what is wrong. ~ Thomas Jefferson
History, I believe, furnishes no example of a priest-ridden people maintaining a free civil government. This marks the lowest grade of ignorance of which their civil as well as religious leaders will always avail themselves for their own purposes. ~ Thomas Jefferson, letter to Alexander von Humboldt, 6 December, 1813
Beware the man of a single book. ~ Thomas Aquinas
Nothing can illustrate these observations more forcibly, than a recollection of the happy conjuncture of times and circumstances, under which our Republic assumed its rank among the Nations; The foundation of our Empire was not laid in the gloomy age of Ignorance and Superstition, but at an Epoch when the rights of mankind were better understood and more clearly defined, than at any former period, the researches of the human mind, after social happiness, have been carried to a great extent, the Treasures of knowledge, acquired by the labors of Philosophers, Sages and Legislatures, through a long succession of years, are laid open for our use, and their collected wisdom may be happily applied in the Establishment of our forms of Government; the free cultivation of Letters, the unbounded extension of Commerce, the progressive refinement of Manners, the growing liberality of sentiment have had a meliorating influence on mankind and increased the blessings of Society. At this auspicious period, the United States came into existence as a Nation, and if their Citizens should not be completely free and happy, the fault will be entirely their own. ~ George Washington, Circular to the States, 8 June 1783
Imagine the people who believe such things and who are not ashamed to ignore, totally, all the patient findings of thinking minds through all the centuries since the Bible was written. And it is these ignorant people, the most uneducated, the most unimaginative, the most unthinking among us, who would make themselves the guides and leaders of us all; who would force their feeble and childish beliefs on us; who would invade our schools and libraries and homes. I personally resent it bitterly. ~ Isaac Asimov
Never underestimate the power of stupid people in large groups. ~ George Carlin
Sometimes a man wants to be stupid if it lets him do a thing his cleverness forbids. ~ John Steinbeck
He knows nothing; and he thinks he knows everything. That points clearly to a political career. ~ George Bernard Shaw
Beware of false knowledge; it is more dangerous than ignorance. ~ George Bernard Shaw
All you need in this life is ignorance and confidence, and then success is sure. ~ Mark Twain
The voice of the intelligence is drowned out by the roar of fear. It is ignored by the voice of desire. It is contradicted by the voice of shame. It is biased by hate and extinguished by anger. Most of all it is silenced by ignorance. ~ Karl A. Menninger
The truth is incontrovertible. Malice may attack it, ignorance may deride it, but in the end, there it is. ~ Winston Churchill
Nothing in all the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity. ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.
Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge: it is those who know little, and not those who know much, who so positively assert that this or that problem will never be solved by science. ~ Charles Darwin
It is certain, in any case, that ignorance, allied with power, is the most ferocious enemy justice can have. ~ James A. Baldwin
I know of no time in human history where ignorance was better than knowledge. ~ Neil deGrasse Tyson
By giving us the opinions of the uneducated, journalism keeps us in touch with the ignorance of the community. ~ Oscar Wilde
Where ignorance is bliss it’s foolish to borrow your neighbor’s newspaper. ~ Kin Hubbard
All I know is just what I read in the papers, and that’s an alibi for my ignorance. ~ Will Rogers
If not bliss, ignorance can at least be fun. ~ Carter Burwell
Knowledge will forever govern ignorance; and a people who mean to be their own governors must arm themselves with the power which knowledge gives. ~ James Madison
Ignorance is the softest pillow on which a man can rest his head. ~ Michel de Montaigne
Is it ignorance or apathy? Hey, I don’t know and I don’t care. ~ Jimmy Buffett
Ignorance is not bliss. It is oblivion. ~ Philip Wylie
Ignorance is bliss. I wish I still had some. ~ Adam Pascal
Democracy is a pathetic belief in the collective wisdom of individual ignorance. ~ H. L. Mencken
Not ignorance, but ignorance of ignorance, is the death of knowledge. ~ Alfred North Whitehead
A great deal of intelligence can be invested in ignorance when the need for illusion is deep. ~ Saul Bellow
Ignorance is bold and knowledge reserved. ~ Thucydides
The greater the ignorance, the greater the dogmatism. ~ William Osler
It is not ignorance but knowledge which is the mother of wonder. ~ Joseph Wood Krutch
Most ignorance is vincible ignorance. We don’t know because we don’t want to know. ~ Aldous Huxley
Ignorance, when voluntary, is criminal, and a man may be properly charged with that evil which he neglected or refused to learn how to prevent. ~ Samuel Johnson
Cruelty is all out of ignorance. If you knew what was in store for you, you wouldn’t hurt anybody, because whatever you do comes back much more forceful than you send it out. ~ Willie Nelson
Our knowledge is a receding mirage in an expanding desert of ignorance. ~ Will Durant
If knowledge can create problems, it is not through ignorance that we can solve them. ~ Isaac Asimov
Ignorance is the soil in which belief in miracles grows. ~ Robert Green Ingersoll
He was distinguished for ignorance; for he had only one idea, and that was wrong. ~ Benjamin Disraeli
Reason obeys itself; and ignorance submits to whatever is dictated to it. ~ Thomas Paine
We live on a placid island of ignorance in the midst of black seas of infinity, and it was not meant that we should voyage far. ~ H. P. Lovecraft
My relationships with my cats have saved me from a deadly, pervasive ignorance. ~ William S. Burroughs
Chance is a name for our ignorance. ~ Leslie Stephen
It is fortunate that each generation does not comprehend its own ignorance. We are thus enabled to call our ancestors barbarous. ~ Charles Dudley Warner
Why waste time learning when ignorance is instantaneous? ~ Bill Watterson
Ignorance is the mother of admiration. ~ George Chapman
I wish you would read a little poetry sometimes. Your ignorance cramps my conversation. ~ Anthony Hope
Without education, we are in a horrible and deadly danger of taking educated people seriously. ~ G. K. Chesterton
If ignorance is bliss, there should be more happy people. ~ Victor Cousin
He must be very ignorant, for he answers every question he is asked. ~ Voltaire
Whoever said ignorance is bliss must have died a horrible death with a really surprised look on his face. ~ Lisa Shearin
Just Above Sunset 