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teaching quotes

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“Before all masters, necessity is the one most listened to, and who teaches the best.” Jules Verne, The Mysterious Island
“We teach people how to remember, we never teach them how to grow.” Oscar Wilde, Intentions
“The whole art of teaching is only the art of awakening the natural curiosity of young minds for the purpose of satisfying it afterwards; and curiosity itself can be vivid and wholesome only in proportion as the mind is contented and happy.” Anatole France, The Crime of Sylvestre Bonnard
“Education is an admirable thing, but it is well to remember from time to time that nothing that is worth knowing can be taught.” Oscar Wilde, Intentions
“A teacher who is not dogmatic is simply a teacher who is not teaching.” G. K. Chesterton, What's Wrong with the World
“We never know which lives we influence, or when, or why. Not until the future eats the present, anyway. We know when it’s too late.” Stephen King, 11/22/63
“the processes of teaching the child that everything cannot be as he wills it are apt to be painful both to him and to his teacher.” Helen Keller, The Story of My Life
“I have always felt that the true text-book for the pupil is his teacher.” Mahatma Gandhi, The Story of my Experiments with Truth
“Much learning does not teach understanding, otherwise it would have taught Hesiod and Pythagoras, Xenophanes and Hecataeus.” Heraclitus, On Nature
“I taught you everything you know. But I didn’t teach you everything I know.” Orson Scott Card, Ender's Game
“It has not come to you by means of teachings! And—thus is my thought, oh exalted one,—nobody will obtain salvation by means of teachings!” Hermann Hesse, Siddhartha
“And in my classes, I will talk most of the time, and you will listen most of the time. Because you may be smart, but I've been smart longer.” John Green, Looking for Alaska
“Machiavelli . . . He professed to teach kings; but it was the people he really taught.” Jean-Jacques Rousseau, The Social Contract
“Let him not be taught science, let him discover it. If ever you substitute authority for reason he will cease to reason; he will be a mere plaything of other people's thoughts.” Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Emile, or On Education
“Miss Kirwin was that rare educator who was in love with information. I will always believe that her love of teaching came not only from her liking for students but also from her desire to make sure that some of the things she knew would find new...” Maya Angelou, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings
“Sectarian feeling and criticism of other teachings or other sects is very bad, poisonous, and should be avoided.” 14th Dalai Lama, Kindness, Clarity, and Insight
“Religion and spirituality are very different, but people often confuse the two. Some things cannot be taught, but they can be awakened in the heart.” Muhammad Ali, The Soul of a Butterfly
“No one is born hating another person because of the color of his skin, or his background, or his religion. People must learn to hate, and if they can learn to hate, they can be taught to love, for love comes more naturally to the human heart than...” Nelson Mandela, Long Walk to Freedom
“there was no teaching a truly searching person, someone who truly wanted to find, could accept. But he who had found, he could approve of any teachings, every path, every goal” Hermann Hesse, Siddhartha
“the tools which would teach men their own use would be beyond price.” Plato, The Republic
“Once you teach people to say what they do not understand, it is easy enough to get them to say anything you like.” Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Emile, or On Education
“Never attempt to teach a pig to sing; it wastes your time and annoys the pig.” Robert A. Heinlein, Time Enough for Love
“Those honour Nature well, who teach that she can speak on everything, even on theology.” Blaise Pascal, Pensées
“people never learn anything by being told; they have to find out for themselves.” Paulo Coelho, Veronika Decides to Die
“suffering has been stronger than all other teaching, and has taught me to understand what your heart used to be. I have been bent and broken, but—I hope—into a better shape.” Charles Dickens, Great Expectations
“It is not easy to determine the nature of music, or why any one should have a knowledge of it.” Aristotle, Politics
“What is a good man but a bad man's teacher? What is a bad man but a good man's job?” Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching
“I have just three things to teach: simplicity, patience, compassion.” Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching
“I believe that what we become depends on what our fathers teach us at odd moments, when they aren't trying to teach us. We are formed by little scraps of wisdom.” Umberto Eco, Foucault's Pendulum
“My teachings are easy to understand and easy to put into practice. Yet your intellect will never grasp them, and if you try to practice them, you'll fail. My teachings are older than the world. How can you grasp their meaning? If you want to know...” Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching
“If philosophy among other vagaries were also to have the notion that it could occur to a man to act in accordance with its teaching, one might make out of that a queer comedy.” Søren Kierkegaard, Fear and Trembling
“But there is one thing which these so clear, these so venerable teachings do not contain: they do not contain the mystery of what the exalted one has experienced for himself, he alone among hundreds of thousands.” Hermann Hesse, Siddhartha
“Among the many short cuts to science, we badly need some one to teach us the art of learning with difficulty.” Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Emile, or On Education
“This is why I am continuing my travels—not to seek other, better teachings, for I know there are none, but to depart from all teachings and all teachers and to reach my goal by myself or to die.” Hermann Hesse, Siddhartha
“Bodily exercise, when compulsory, does no harm to the body; but knowledge which is acquired under compulsion obtains no hold on the mind.” Plato, The Republic

Related topics

mind understanding education learning knowledge compassion thought experience self curiosity simplicity science will wisdom books heart patience change good pain

Related authors

Jean-Jacques Rousseau (4)
Hermann Hesse (4)
Lao Tzu (3)
Plato (2)
Oscar Wilde (2)
Nelson Mandela (1)
Jules Verne (1)
Maya Angelou (1)
Paulo Coelho (1)
Charles Dickens (1)
Stephen King (1)
Mahatma Gandhi (1)
John Green (1)
Aristotle (1)
Anatole France (1)
Blaise Pascal (1)
Muhammad Ali (1)
G. K. Chesterton (1)
Helen Keller (1)
Heraclitus (1)

Related sources

Siddhartha (4)
Tao Te Ching (3)
Emile, or On Education (3)
The Republic (2)
Intentions (2)
I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings (1)
Long Walk to Freedom (1)
The Soul of a Butterfly (1)
The Story of my Experiments with Truth (1)
Fear and Trembling (1)
Great Expectations (1)
On Nature (1)
The Social Contract (1)
Veronika Decides to Die (1)
The Crime of Sylvestre Bonnard (1)
The Story of My Life (1)
Looking for Alaska (1)
Politics (1)
11/22/63 (1)
The Mysterious Island (1)