“It is not enough to have a good mind. The main thing is to use it well.”
Réné Descartes, Discours de la Méthode (I’ve seen it variously translated; the original is “Ce n'est pas assez d'avoir l'esprit bon, mais le principal est de l'appliquer bien.”)
In my latest National Post column I seize on two New Year’s Eve press releases of the sort that will make 2019 yet another year of political mendacity if we tolerate it.
“It ain’t what a man don’t know as makes him a fool, but what he does know that ain’t so.”
The “homely wisdom of Josh Billings (1818-1885)” quoted in Daniel Boorstin Cleopatra’s Nose
“Many have been the wise speeches of fools, though not so many as the foolish speeches of wise men.”
Thomas Fuller (1608-61) quoted as “Thought du jour” in Globe & Mail May 29, 2000
“How is it that a lame man does not annoy us while a lame mind does? Because a lame man recognizes that we are walking straight, while a lame mind says that it is we who are limping. But for that we should feel sorry rather than angry.”
Blaise Pascal Pensées
“Descartes once joked about common sense that it must be universal, because he had yet to meet anyone who didn’t claim to have it.”
Michael Potemra in National Review Jan. 27, 2003 (I believe he was referring to the opening line of Discours de la Méthode: “Le bon sens est la chose du monde la mieux partagée: car chacun pense en être si bien pourvu que ceux même qui sont les plus difficiles à contenter en toute autre chose n’ont point coutume d’en désirer plus qu’ils en ont.”)