Mistakes Quotes

Most popular mistakes quotes

A subtle thought that is in error may yet give rise to fruitful inquiry that can establish truths of great value. - Isaac Asimov quote.
A subtle thought that is in error may yet give rise to fruitful inquiry that can establish truths of great value.
The cautious seldom err. - Confucius quote.
The cautious seldom err.

caution

To stumble twice against the same stone is a proverbial disgrace. - Cicero quote.
To stumble twice against the same stone is a proverbial disgrace.
Truth comes out of error more readily than out of confusion. - Francis Bacon quote.
Truth comes out of error more readily than out of confusion.
To err is human, to forgive divine. - Alexander Pope quote.
To err is human, to forgive divine.
It is error only, and not truth, that shrinks from inquiry. - Thomas Paine quote.
It is error only, and not truth, that shrinks from inquiry.

error truth

A man's errors are what make him amiable. - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe quote.
A man's errors are what make him amiable.
The man who makes no mistakes does not usually make anything.
Irrationally held truths may be more harmful than reasoned errors. - Thomas Huxley quote.
Irrationally held truths may be more harmful than reasoned errors.

rational thinking

Next to the promulgation of truth, the best thing I can coneive that man can do is the public recantation of an error.
Give me the fruitful error any time, full of seeds, bursting with its own corrections. You can keep your sterile truth for yourself.
One of the hardest things in this world is to admit you are wrong. And nothing is more helpful in resolving an argument than its frank admission. - Benjamin Disraeli quote.
One of the hardest things in this world is to admit you are wrong. And nothing is more helpful in resolving an argument than its frank admission.

arguments

Better to ask twice than to lose your way once.
— Danish proverb

advice proverbs Danish proverbs asking questions

People will listen a great deal more patiently while you explain your mistakes than when you explain your successes.

conversation

Every uncorrected error and unrepented sin is, in its own right, a fountain of fresh error and fresh sin flowing on to the end of time. - C. S. Lewis quote.
Every uncorrected error and unrepented sin is, in its own right, a fountain of fresh error and fresh sin flowing on to the end of time.

sin repentance

There are some errors so sweet that we repent them only to bring them to memory. - Jean Antoine Petit-Senn quote.
There are some errors so sweet that we repent them only to bring them to memory.
Everybody should have a chance at a breathtaking piece of folly. - Elizabeth Taylor quote.
Everybody should have a chance at a breathtaking piece of folly.
Admit your errors freely and soon. - John Perry Barlow quote.
Admit your errors freely and soon.
Nowadays most people die of a sort of creeping common sense, and discover when it is too late that the only things one never regrets are one's mistakes. - Oscar Wilde quote.
Nowadays most people die of a sort of creeping common sense, and discover when it is too late that the only things one never regrets are one's mistakes.

regret

Love truth, but pardon error. - Voltaire quote.
Love truth, but pardon error.
Voltaire Sept Discours en vers sur l’homme

truth error

Success covers a multitude of blunders. - George Bernard Shaw quote.
Success covers a multitude of blunders.

success

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.

humility

There's no way that you can live an adequate life without many mistakes. In fact, one trick in life is to get so you can handle mistakes. - Charlie Munger quote.
There's no way that you can live an adequate life without many mistakes. In fact, one trick in life is to get so you can handle mistakes.
I think the attitude of Epictetus is the best. He thought that every missed chance in life was an opportunity to behave well, every missed chance in life was an opportunity to learn something, and that your duty was not to be submerged in self-pity, but to utilize the terrible blow in constructive fashion. That is a very good idea. - Charlie Munger quote.
I think the attitude of Epictetus is the best. He thought that every missed chance in life was an opportunity to behave well, every missed chance in life was an opportunity to learn something, and that your duty was not to be submerged in self-pity, but to utilize the terrible blow in constructive fashion. That is a very good idea.
To err is human; to refrain from laughing, humane.

how to live life

You will do foolish things, but do them with enthusiasm. - Colette quote.
You will do foolish things, but do them with enthusiasm.

advisory

Anyone can make a mistake. A fool insists on repeating it.

foolishness

Follies change their type but foolishness remains. - Erich Kästner quote.
Follies change their type but foolishness remains.

foolishness

We all have weaknesses. But I have figured that others have put up with mine so tolerantly that I would be less than fair not to make a reasonable discount for theirs. - William Allen White quote.
We all have weaknesses. But I have figured that others have put up with mine so tolerantly that I would be less than fair not to make a reasonable discount for theirs.

tolerance forgiveness judging

We learn to walk by stumbling.
— Bulgarian proverb

proverbs

If you can't make a mistake, you can't make anything. - Marva Collins quote.
If you can't make a mistake, you can't make anything.
A stumble may prevent a fall.
— English proverb

adversity English proverbs proverbs

He who never made a mistake never made a discovery. - Samuel Smiles quote.
He who never made a mistake never made a discovery.
A mistake proves that someone stopped talking long enough to do something.

action

Mistakes are the usual bridge between inexperience and wisdom.

wisdom experience

We're all proud of making little mistakes. It gives us the feeling we don't make any big ones. - Andy Rooney quote.
We're all proud of making little mistakes. It gives us the feeling we don't make any big ones.

funny

To err is human; to admit it, superhuman. - Doug Larson quote.
To err is human; to admit it, superhuman.

funny

Admit your errors before someone else exaggerates them.
There is no saint without a past—no sinner without a future.
— ANCIENT PERSIAN MASS

hopeful

It is very easy to forgive others their mistakes; it takes more grit and gumption to forgive them for having witnessed your own. - Jessamyn West quote.
It is very easy to forgive others their mistakes; it takes more grit and gumption to forgive them for having witnessed your own.

human nature pride forgiveness

The worst part is not in making a mistake but in trying to justify it, instead of using it as a heaven-sent warning of our mindlessness or our ignorance.
To obtain maximum attention, it's hard to beat a good, big mistake.
Your worst humiliation is only someone else's momentary entertainment.
If all else fails, immortality can always be assured by spectacular error. - John Kenneth Galbraith quote.
If all else fails, immortality can always be assured by spectacular error.
I want to be able to explain my mistakes. This means I do only the things I completely understand. - Warren Buffett quote.
I want to be able to explain my mistakes. This means I do only the things I completely understand.

investing

If you don't make mistakes, you can't make decisions. - Warren Buffett quote.
If you don't make mistakes, you can't make decisions.
There is no man, however wise, who has not at some period of his youth said things, or lived in a way the consciousness of which is so unpleasant to him in later life that he would gladly, if he could, expunge it from his memory. - Marcel Proust quote.
There is no man, however wise, who has not at some period of his youth said things, or lived in a way the consciousness of which is so unpleasant to him in later life that he would gladly, if he could, expunge it from his memory.
The only thing I regret about my past is the length of it. If I had to live my life again I'd make all the same mistakes - only sooner. - Tallulah Bankhead quote.
The only thing I regret about my past is the length of it. If I had to live my life again I'd make all the same mistakes - only sooner.

life

While one person hesitates because he feels inferior, the other is busy making mistakes and becoming superior.

action competition effort

It is the true nature of mankind to learn from mistakes, not from example. - Fred Hoyle quote.
It is the true nature of mankind to learn from mistakes, not from example.

experience

The greatest mistake you can make in life is continually fearing that you'll make one. - Elbert Hubbard quote.
The greatest mistake you can make in life is continually fearing that you'll make one.
If I wasn't making mistakes, I wasn't making decisions.
The first undertakers in all great attempts commonly miscarry and leave the advantages of their losses to those who come after them. - Samuel Butler quote.
The first undertakers in all great attempts commonly miscarry and leave the advantages of their losses to those who come after them.
One should never do anything that one cannot talk about after dinner. - Oscar Wilde quote.
One should never do anything that one cannot talk about after dinner.
To err is human, to forgive, divine.
I never made a mistake in my life; at least, never one that I couldn't explain away afterwards. - Rudyard Kipling quote.
I never made a mistake in my life; at least, never one that I couldn't explain away afterwards.
Don't ever take a fence down until you know why it was put up. - Robert Frost quote.
Don't ever take a fence down until you know why it was put up.
If you shut your door to all errors truth will be shut out. - Rabindranath Tagore quote.
If you shut your door to all errors truth will be shut out.
The fatal tendency of mankind to leave off thinking about a thing when it is no longer doubtful is the cause of half their errors. - John Stuart Mill quote.
The fatal tendency of mankind to leave off thinking about a thing when it is no longer doubtful is the cause of half their errors.
If only we could have two lives: the first in which to make one's mistakes, which seem as if they have to be made; and the second in which to profit by them. - D. H. Lawrence quote.
If only we could have two lives: the first in which to make one's mistakes, which seem as if they have to be made; and the second in which to profit by them.
If we had no faults of our own, we would not take so much pleasure in noticing those of others. - François de La Rochefoucauld quote.
If we had no faults of our own, we would not take so much pleasure in noticing those of others.
When the defects of others are perceived with so much clarity, it is because one possesses them oneself. - Jules Renard quote.
When the defects of others are perceived with so much clarity, it is because one possesses them oneself.
When you make a mistake, admit it. If you don't, you only make matters worse.
I don't want to make the wrong mistake. - Yogi Berra quote.
I don't want to make the wrong mistake.
Stumbling is not falling.

failure

Truth burns up error. - Sojourner Truth quote.
Truth burns up error.

truth

It is one thing to show a man that he is in an error, and another to put him in possession of the truth. - John Locke quote.
It is one thing to show a man that he is in an error, and another to put him in possession of the truth.
John Locke An Essay Concerning Human Understanding

truth

The road to wisdom? -- Well, it's plain
and simple to express:
Err
and err
and err again
but less
and less
and less.

wisdom

It is only an error in judgment to make a mistake, but it argues an infirmity of character to stick to it. - Adela Rogers St. Johns quote.
It is only an error in judgment to make a mistake, but it argues an infirmity of character to stick to it.

error character judgment

Every decision you make is a mistake.
Edward Dahlberg The Frank Muir Book: An Irreverent Companion to Social History

decision-making

Back of every mistaken venture and defeat is the laughter of wisdom, if you listen.  Every blunder behind us is giving a cheer for us. - Carl Sandburg quote.
Back of every mistaken venture and defeat is the laughter of wisdom, if you listen.  Every blunder behind us is giving a cheer for us.

defeat

A man of genius makes no mistakes.  His errors are volitional and are the portals of discovery.

discovery genius error

An error is the more dangerous in proportion to the degree of truth which it contains. - Henri-Frédéric Amiel quote.
An error is the more dangerous in proportion to the degree of truth which it contains.

error truth

Truth emerges more readily from error than confusion. - Francis Bacon quote.
Truth emerges more readily from error than confusion.

truth error

It seems, indeed, a necessary weakness of our mind to be able to reach truth only across a multitude of errors and obstacles. - Claude Bernard quote.
It seems, indeed, a necessary weakness of our mind to be able to reach truth only across a multitude of errors and obstacles.
Claude Bernard An Introduction to the Study of Experimental Medicine

mind truth error

There is no such source of error as the pursuit of absolute truth. - Samuel Butler quote.
There is no such source of error as the pursuit of absolute truth.

truth error

Error proliferates. Man tracks it down and cuts it up into little pieces hoping to turn it into grains of truth.

error truth

To rise from error to truth is rare and beautiful. - Victor Hugo quote.
To rise from error to truth is rare and beautiful.

error truth

The study of error is not only in the highest degree prophylactic, but it serves as a stimulating introduction to the study of truth. - Walter Lippmann quote.
The study of error is not only in the highest degree prophylactic, but it serves as a stimulating introduction to the study of truth.

truth error

If you shut your door to all errors, truth will be shut out.

truth error

An error becomes a mistake when we refuse to admit it. - Marilyn vos Savant quote.
An error becomes a mistake when we refuse to admit it.

error

Experience, the name men give to their mistakes.  I never commit any. - Oscar Wilde quote.
Experience, the name men give to their mistakes.  I never commit any.

experience

If you have made mistakes, even serious mistakes, there is always another chance for you.  And supposing you have tried and failed again and again, you may have a fresh start any moment you choose, for this thing that we call "failure"  is not the falling down, but the staying down.

second chances failure

But time strips our illusions of their hue,
And one by one in turn, some grand mistake
Casts off its bright skin yearly, like a snake. - Lord Byron quote.
But time strips our illusions of their hue,
And one by one in turn, some grand mistake
Casts off its bright skin yearly, like a snake.

illusion

I have learned throughout my life as a composer chiefly through my mistakes and pursuits of false assumptions, not by my exposure to founts of wisdom and knowledge. - Igor Stravinsky quote.
I have learned throughout my life as a composer chiefly through my mistakes and pursuits of false assumptions, not by my exposure to founts of wisdom and knowledge.

learning

Living is like working out a long addition sum, and if you make a mistake in the first two totals you will never find the right answer. - Cesare Pavese quote.
Living is like working out a long addition sum, and if you make a mistake in the first two totals you will never find the right answer.

life

The higher your position, the more mistakes you're allowed.  In fact, if you make enough of them, it's considered your style. - Fred Astaire quote.
The higher your position, the more mistakes you're allowed.  In fact, if you make enough of them, it's considered your style.

style

There are no mistakes.  The events we bring upon ourselves, no matter how unpleasant, are necessary in order to learn what we need to learn; whatever steps we take, they're necessary to reach the places we've chosen to go. - Richard Bach quote.
There are no mistakes.  The events we bring upon ourselves, no matter how unpleasant, are necessary in order to learn what we need to learn; whatever steps we take, they're necessary to reach the places we've chosen to go.
You can spend the entire second half of your life recovering from the mistakes of the first half. - Saul Bellow quote.
You can spend the entire second half of your life recovering from the mistakes of the first half.
There's nothing final about a mistake, except its being taken as final. - Phyllis Bottome quote.
There's nothing final about a mistake, except its being taken as final.
Every great mistake has a halfway moment, a split second when it can be recalled and perhaps remedied. - Pearl Buck quote.
Every great mistake has a halfway moment, a split second when it can be recalled and perhaps remedied.
Mistakes are the only universal form of originality.
This is a hard and precarious world, where every mistake and infirmity must be paid for in full.
Mistakes are a part of being human. Appreciate your mistakes for what they are: precious life lessons that can only be learned the hard way.
Mistakes are a fact of life
It is the response to error that counts.
Our "mistakes" become crucial parts, sometimes the best parts, of the lives we have made.
Men heap together the mistakes of their lives and create a monster which they call Destiny.
Mistakes are, after all, the foundations of truth, and if a man does not know what a thing is, it is at least an increase in knowledge if he knows what it is not. - Carl Jung quote.
Mistakes are, after all, the foundations of truth, and if a man does not know what a thing is, it is at least an increase in knowledge if he knows what it is not.
If only one could have two lives: the first, in which to make one's mistakes, which seem as if they had to be made; and the second in which to profit by them. - D. H. Lawrence quote.
If only one could have two lives: the first, in which to make one's mistakes, which seem as if they had to be made; and the second in which to profit by them.
Your best teacher is your last mistake. - Ralph Nader quote.
Your best teacher is your last mistake.

teaching

Mistakes are the adolescence of experience. - Robert Orben quote.
Mistakes are the adolescence of experience.
In general, pride is at the bottom of all great mistakes. - John Ruskin quote.
In general, pride is at the bottom of all great mistakes.

pride

My mistakes loom large and reign ignoble, but my takeaways thread veins of iron into my fabric.
It is not because the truth is too difficult to see that we make mistakes. It may even lie on the surface; but we make mistakes because the easiest and most comfortable course for us is to seek insight where it accords with our emotions—especially  selfish ones. - Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn quote.
It is not because the truth is too difficult to see that we make mistakes. It may even lie on the surface; but we make mistakes because the easiest and most comfortable course for us is to seek insight where it accords with our emotions—especially  selfish ones.

self-deception

Mistakes live in the neighborhood of truth
and therefore delude us. - Rabindranath Tagore quote.
Mistakes live in the neighborhood of truth
and therefore delude us.
Mistakes are at the very base of human thought, embedded there, feeding the structure like root nodules.  If we were not provided with the knack of being wrong, we could never get anything useful done. - Lewis Thomas quote.
Mistakes are at the very base of human thought, embedded there, feeding the structure like root nodules.  If we were not provided with the knack of being wrong, we could never get anything useful done.
It is not because the truth is too difficult to see that we make mistakes. It may even lie on the surface; but we make mistakes because the easiest and most comfortable course for us is to seek insight where it accords with our emotions—especially selfish ones.

truth selfishness

Many a truth is the result of an error. - Marie von Eschenbach quote.
Many a truth is the result of an error.

truth

Error is to truth as sleep is to waking.  I have observed that one turns, as if refreshed, from error back to truth. - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe quote.
Error is to truth as sleep is to waking.  I have observed that one turns, as if refreshed, from error back to truth.

truth

History warns us, however, that it is the customary fate of new truths to begin as heresies and to end as superstitions. - Thomas Huxley quote.
History warns us, however, that it is the customary fate of new truths to begin as heresies and to end as superstitions.

truth

Victory goes to the player who makes the next-to-last mistake.

competition

Experience enables you to recognize a mistake when you make it again. - Franklin P. Jones quote.
Experience enables you to recognize a mistake when you make it again.

funny experience

A mistake is always forgivable, rarely excusable and always unacceptable.

forgiveness

Mistakes are always forgivable, if one has the courage to admit them. - Bruce Lee quote.
Mistakes are always forgivable, if one has the courage to admit them.

forgiveness

Even the knowledge of my own fallibility cannot keep me from making mistakes. Only when I fall do I get up again. - Vincent van Gogh quote.
Even the knowledge of my own fallibility cannot keep me from making mistakes. Only when I fall do I get up again.

knowledge

If you make a mistake and do not correct it, this is called a mistake. - Confucius quote.
If you make a mistake and do not correct it, this is called a mistake.
Most people die of a sort of creeping common sense, and discover when it is too late that the only things one never regrets are one's mistakes. - Oscar Wilde quote.
Most people die of a sort of creeping common sense, and discover when it is too late that the only things one never regrets are one's mistakes.

common sense

Don't look where you fall, but where you slipped.

proverbs African proverbs

Some mistakes will be made along the way. That's good, because at least some decisions are being made along the way. - Steve Jobs quote.
Some mistakes will be made along the way. That's good, because at least some decisions are being made along the way.

management

A recognized and corrected error vanishes leaving two things of great value—experience of error, and how to rise above it.
Everyone makes mistakes. The wise are not people who never make mistakes, but those who forgive themselves and learn from their mistakes.
To learn from a mistake, first figure out if it was really a mistake.