Quotes by Alfred North Whitehead

Wisdom alone is true ambition’s aim, wisdom is the source of virtue and of fame obtained with labour, for mankind employed, and then, when most you share it, best enjoyed.

Knowledge shrinks as wisdom grows.

Civilization advances by extending the number of important operations which we can perform without thinking of them.

No one who achieves success does so without acknowledging the help of others. The wise and confident acknowledge this help with gratitude.

It is the business of the future to be dangerous and it is among the merits of science that it equips the future for its duties.

Religion is the last refuge of human savagery.

If a dog jumps into your lap, it is because he is fond of you but if a cat does the same thing, it is because your lap is warmer.

Speech is human nature itself, with none of the artificiality of written language.

Fools act on imagination without knowledge, pedants act on knowledge without imagination.

Not ignorance, but ignorance of ignorance, is the death of knowledge.