We ought not to look back, unless it is to derive useful lessons from past errors, and for the purpose of profiting by dear bought experience. To enveigh against things that are past and irremediable, is unpleasing; but to steer clear of the shelves and rocks we have struck upon, is the part of wisdom, equally as incumbent on political as other men, who have their own little bark, or that of others, to navigate through the intricate paths of life, or the trackless ocean, to the haven of security and rest.
GEORGE WASHINGTON, letter to Major-General Armstrong, Mar. 26, 1781
Experience is the name everyone gives to their mistakes.
OSCAR WILDE, Lady Windermere's Fan
One thorn of experience is worth a whole wilderness of warning.
JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL, Among My Books
- The dirty nurse, Experience, in her kind
- Hath foul'd me.
ALFRED, LORD TENNYSON, The Idylls of the King
Experience is never limited, and it is never complete; it is an immense sensibility, a kind of huge spider-web of the finest silken threads suspended in the chamber of consciousness, and catching every air-borne particle in its tissue.
HENRY JAMES, The Art of Fiction
To rectify past blunders is impossible, but we might profit by the experience of them.
GEORGE WASHINGTON, letter to Fielding Lewis, Jul. 6, 1780
A baby has brains, but it doesn't know much. Experience is the only thing that brings knowledge, and the longer you are on earth the more experience you are sure to get.
L. FRANK BAUM, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz
No man's knowledge can go beyond his experience.
JOHN LOCKE, Essay Concerning Human Understanding
Experience keeps a dear school, yet fools will learn in no other.
BENJAMIN FRANKLIN, Poor Richard's Almanac
Experience teaches slowly, and at the cost of mistakes.
JAMES ANTHONY FROUDE, Short Studies on Great Subjects
Experience gives us the tests first and the lessons later.
NAOMI JUDD, public radio interview, 1994
A moment's insight is sometimes worth a life's experience.
OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES, The Professor at the Breakfast Table
What is all knowledge too but recorded experience?
THOMAS CARLYLE, Critical and Miscellaneous Essays
Experience is the child of Thought, and Thought is the child of Action. We cannot learn men from books.
BENJAMIN DISRAELI, Vivian Grey
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