Humility Quotes

Most popular humility quotes

Nothing is so hard to do so gracefully as getting off your high horse. - Franklin P. Jones quote.
Nothing is so hard to do so gracefully as getting off your high horse.
Humility is the most difficult of all virtues to achieve; nothing dies harder than the desire to think well of oneself. - T. S. Eliot quote.
Humility is the most difficult of all virtues to achieve; nothing dies harder than the desire to think well of oneself.
Humility, like darkness, reveals the heavenly lights. - Henry David Thoreau quote.
Humility, like darkness, reveals the heavenly lights.
Life is a long lesson in humility. - J. M. Barrie quote.
Life is a long lesson in humility.

life

We come nearest to the great when we are great in humility. - Rabindranath Tagore quote.
We come nearest to the great when we are great in humility.
Too humble is half proud.

pride

It was pride that changed angels into devils; it is humility that makes men as angels. - Augustine of Hippo quote.
It was pride that changed angels into devils; it is humility that makes men as angels.
The seeker after truth should be humbler than the dust. - Mahatma Gandhi quote.
The seeker after truth should be humbler than the dust.
A Master who cannot bow to a disciple cannot bow to Buddha. - Shunryu Suzuki quote.
A Master who cannot bow to a disciple cannot bow to Buddha.

respect

I like people admitting they were complete stupid horses' asses. I know I'll perform better if I rub my nose in my mistakes. This is a wonderful trick to learn. - Charlie Munger quote.
I like people admitting they were complete stupid horses' asses. I know I'll perform better if I rub my nose in my mistakes. This is a wonderful trick to learn.

mistakes

It's hard to be humble, when you're as great as I am. - Muhammad Ali quote.
It's hard to be humble, when you're as great as I am.

greatness

In artful boasting, one states all the information necessary to impress people, but keeps the facts decently clothed in the language of humility. - Judith Martin quote.
In artful boasting, one states all the information necessary to impress people, but keeps the facts decently clothed in the language of humility.
Humility makes us charitable toward our neighbor.  Nothing will make us so generous and merciful to the faults of others as seeing our own faults.

charity

Real excellence and humility are consequently not incompatible one with the other; on the contrary, they are twin sisters.

excellence

Humility is a grace that shines in a high condition but cannot, equally, in a low one because a person in the latter is already, perhaps, too much humbled. - Samuel Richardson quote.
Humility is a grace that shines in a high condition but cannot, equally, in a low one because a person in the latter is already, perhaps, too much humbled.

grace

You aspire to great things?  Begin with little ones.  You desire to erect a very high building?  Think first of the foundation of humility.  The higher one intends it, the deeper must the foundation be laid. - Augustine of Hippo quote.
You aspire to great things?  Begin with little ones.  You desire to erect a very high building?  Think first of the foundation of humility.  The higher one intends it, the deeper must the foundation be laid.
Nothing is more deceitful than the appearance of humility. It is often only carelessness of opinion, and sometimes an indirect boast. - Jane Austen quote.
Nothing is more deceitful than the appearance of humility. It is often only carelessness of opinion, and sometimes an indirect boast.
All politicians are humble, and seldom let you forget it. They go around the country boasting about their humility. They are proud of their humility. Many are downright arrogant about their humility and insist that it qualifies them to be President. - Russell Baker quote.
All politicians are humble, and seldom let you forget it. They go around the country boasting about their humility. They are proud of their humility. Many are downright arrogant about their humility and insist that it qualifies them to be President.

politicians

Whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and whoever humbles himself will be exalted.
— The Bible—Matthew 23:12

biblical

And the Devil did grin, for his darling sin
Is pride that apes humility. - Samuel Coleridge quote.
And the Devil did grin, for his darling sin
Is pride that apes humility.
The higher we are placed, the more humbly we should walk. - Cicero quote.
The higher we are placed, the more humbly we should walk.
Humility has its origin in an awareness of unworthiness, and sometimes too in a dazzled awareness of saintliness. - Colette quote.
Humility has its origin in an awareness of unworthiness, and sometimes too in a dazzled awareness of saintliness.
Colette Belles Saisons: A Colette Scrapbook
Pride sings and dances; humility sighs.
It is difficult to be humble.  Even if you aim at humility, there is no guarantee that when you have attained the state you will not be proud of the feat.
Humility must always be the portion of any man who receives acclaim earned in the blood of his followers and the sacrifices of his friends. - Dwight D. Eisenhower quote.
Humility must always be the portion of any man who receives acclaim earned in the blood of his followers and the sacrifices of his friends.
Humility is so shy.  If you begin talking about it, it leaves. - Timothy Keller quote.
Humility is so shy.  If you begin talking about it, it leaves.
Humility is often only a feigned submissiveness by which men hope to bring other people to submit to them; it is a more calculated sort of pride. - François de La Rochefoucauld quote.
Humility is often only a feigned submissiveness by which men hope to bring other people to submit to them; it is a more calculated sort of pride.
The moment that humility becomes self-conscious, it becomes hubris.  One cannot be humble and aware of oneself at the same time. - Madelein K. L'Engle quote.
The moment that humility becomes self-conscious, it becomes hubris.  One cannot be humble and aware of oneself at the same time.
In 1969 I published a small book on Humility.  It was a pioneering work which has not, to my knowledge, been superseded.
True humility does not know that it is humble. If it did, it would be proud from the contemplation of so fine a virtue. - Martin Luther quote.
True humility does not know that it is humble. If it did, it would be proud from the contemplation of so fine a virtue.
Genuine humility does not arise from the sense of our pitiable kinship with the dust that is unworthy of us but from the realization of an awful nearness to a magnificence of which we are unworthy.
Humility, that low sweet root,
From which all heavenly virtues shoot.
Personally, I think humility is like underwear—essential, but indecent if it shows.
Discourses on humility are a source of pride in the vain and of humility in the humble. - Blaise Pascal quote.
Discourses on humility are a source of pride in the vain and of humility in the humble.
The primary condition for being sincere is the same as for being humble: not to boast of it, and probably not even to be aware of it.

sincerity

Humility is like oxygen to the soul. You won't get too far without it!
Dina Rolle Adversities & Triumphs in the Midst of It All
Those who travel the high road of humility are not troubled by heavy traffic.
Humility must always be doing its work like a bee making its honey in the hive: without humility all will be lost. - Saint Teresa of Ávila quote.
Humility must always be doing its work like a bee making its honey in the hive: without humility all will be lost.
Humility like darkness reveals the heavenly lights.
Humility is not thinking less of yourself; it is thinking of yourself less. - Rick Warren quote.
Humility is not thinking less of yourself; it is thinking of yourself less.
Rick Warren The Purpose Driven Life: What On Earth Am I Here For?
Humility: The Quiet Virtue.
Don't be so humble - you are not that great. - Golda Meir quote.
Don't be so humble - you are not that great.

witty

Let us be a little humble; let us think that the truth may not perhaps be entirely with us. - Jawaharlal Nehru quote.
Let us be a little humble; let us think that the truth may not perhaps be entirely with us.