The only real difference between a wise man and a fool, Moore knew, was that the wise man tended to make more serious mistakes—and only because no one trusted a fool with really crucial decisions; only the wise had the opportunity to lose battles, or nations.
The only difference between a wise man and a fool is that the wise man knows he's playing.
There is only a finger's difference between a wise man and a fool.
A fool who recognises his own ignorance is thereby in fact a wise man, but a fool who considers himself wise - that is what one really calls a fool.
The fool who recognizes his foolishness, is a wise man. But the fool who believes himself a wise man, he really is a fool.
One great difference between a wise man and a fool is, the former only wishes for what he may possibly obtain; the latter desires impossibilities.
The fool doth think he is wise, but the wise man knows himself a fool.
The great Tibetan meditator Gungtang Jampelyang once asked
'What is the difference between a wise man and a fool?'
The difference lies in their intention. A wise person is someone who has a good intention, not someone who merely possesses knowledge.
Wise is the one who learns from another´s mistakes. Less wise is the one who learns only from his own mistakes. The fool keeps making the same mistakes again and again and never learns from them.
Only a fool learns from his own mistakes. The wise man learns from the mistakes of others.
But for the wise, it says in the Bible: when a wise man hears wisdom, he reacts. When a fool hears it, his acts are folly. If you wanna be a fool, help yourself, it's not my problem.
We could almost say that being willing to be a fool is one of the first wisdoms. So acknowledging foolishness is always a very important and powerful experience. The phenomenal world can be perceived and seen properly if we see it from the perspective of being a fool. There is very little distance between being a fool and being wise; they are extremely close. When we are really, truly fools, when we actually acknowledge our foolishness, then we are way ahead. We are not even in the process of becoming wise — we are already wise.
A wise man may be duped as well as a fool; but the fool publishes the triumph of his deceiver; the wise man is silent, and denies that triumph to an enemy which he would hardly concede to a friend; a triumph that proclaims his own defeat.
No man is so foolish but may give another good counsel sometimes; and no man is so wise, but may easily err, if he will take no others counsel but his own. But very few men are wise by their own counsel; or learned by their own teaching. For he that was only taught by himself had a fool to his master.
The wise are wise only because they love. The fool are fools only because they think they can understand love.
The fool who thinks he is wise is just a fool. The fool who knows he is a fool is wise indeed.
Wine turns the wise man into a fool and the fool into a wise man.