ERROR

Related Subjects: Delusion, Faults, Fool, Guilt, Heresy, Illusion, Lies, Mistake, Sin, Understanding, Wickedness, Wrongs

1. It is only an error of judgment to make a mistake, but it argues an infirmity of character to adhere to it when discovered.—C. N. BOVEE
   

2. An old and gray-headed error.—SIR THOMAS BROWNE, Vulgar Errors
   

3. Then gently scan your brother man,
   Still gentler sister woman;
   Though they may gang a kennin wrang,
   To step aside is human.—BURNS, Address to the Unco Guid
   

4. He that errs in so considerable a passage, may well be suspected to have committed many gross errors through the whole history.—CERVANTES, Don Quixote
   

5. Honest error is to be pitied, not ridiculed.—LORD CHESTERFIELD
   

6. There are errors which no wise man will treat with rudeness, while there is a probability that they may be the refraction of some great truth still below the horizon.—COLERIDGE
   

7. Ignorance has no light, but error follows a false one. The consequence is, that error, when she retraces her steps, has farther to go before she can arrive at truth, than ignorance.—C. C. COLTON
   

8. Most of us, if you will pardon me for betraying the universal secret, have, at some time or other, discovered in ourselves a readiness to stray far, ever so far, on the wrong road.—JOSEPH CONRAD, Notes on Life and Letters
   

9. What can we know? or what can we discern,
   When error chokes the windows of the mind?—SIR JOHN DAVIES, The Vanity of Human Learning
   

10. Errors, like straws, upon the surface flow;
    He who would search for pearls must dive below.—DRYDEN, All for Love
    

11. That men may err was never yet denied.—DRYDEN, The Hind & the Panther
    

12. When a man covers a vast field many errors may be forgiven him if the result adds to our comprehension of life.—DURANT, The Life of Greece
    

13. Our truest steps are human still,—
    To walk unswerving were divine.—O. W. HOLMES, The Crooked Footpath
    

14. Error of opinion may be tolerated where reason is left free to combat it.—JEFFERSON, First Inaugural Address
    

15. Find earth where grows no weed, and you may find a heart wherein no error grows.—THOMAS KNOWLES
    

16. I shall try to correct errors where shown to be errors, and I shall adopt new views as fast as they shall appear to be true views.—LINCOLN
    

17. Error is not a fault of our knowledge, but a mistake of our judgment giving assent to that which is not true.—LOCKE
    

18. Were half the power, that fills the world with terror,
    Were half the wealth, bestowed on camps and courts,
    Given to redeem the human mind from error,
    There were no need of arsenals or forts.—LONGFELLOW, The Arsenal At Springfield
    

19. Sometimes we may learn more from a man's errors, than from his virtues.—LONGFELLOW
    

20. Our understandings are always liable to error. Nature and certainty are very hard to come at, and infallibility is mere vanity and pretence.—MARCUS AURELIUS, Meditations
    

21. Error commonly has some truth in what it affirms, is wrong generally in what it denies.—F. L. PATTON

22. For to err in opinion, though it be not the part of wise men, is at least human.—PLUTARCH
    

23. A man should never be ashamed to own he has been in the wrong, which is but saying, in other words, that he is wiser today than he was yesterday.—POPE, Thoughts on Various Subjects
    

24. Thinks what ne'er was, nor is, nor e'er shall be.—POPE, Essay on Criticism
    

25. To err is human, to forgive divine.—POPE, Essay on Criticism
    

26. Error is always in haste.—Proverb
    

27. It is a manly act to forsake an error.—Proverb
    

28. Every age confutes old errors, and begets new.—Proverb
    

29. Error, though blind herself, sometimes bringeth forth children that can see.—Proverb
    

30. From the errors of others a wise man corrects his own.—PUBLILIUS SYRUS, Sententiae
    

31. Above the pitch, out of tune, and off the hinges.—RABELAIS
    

32. If this be error and upon me proved
    I never writ, nor no man ever loved.—SHAKESPEARE, Sonnet CXVI
    

33. Errors to be dangerous must have a great deal of truth mingled with them. It is only from this alliance that they can ever obtain an extensive circulation. From pure extravagance, and genuine, unmingled falsehood, the world never has, and never can sustain any mischief.—SYDNEY SMITH
    

34. Few practical errors in the world are embraced on conviction, but on inclination; for though the judgment may err on account of weakness, yet, where one error enters at this door, ten are let into it through the will; that, for the most part, being set upon those things which truth is a direct obstacle to the enjoyment of; and where both cannot be had, a man will be sure to buy his enjoyment, though he pays down truth for the purchase.—ROBERT SOUTH
    

35. Men err from selfishness; women because they are weak.—MME. DE STAEL
    

36. An expert is a person who avoids the small errors as he sweeps on to the grand fallacy.—BENJAMIN STOLBERG
    

37. To err
    From the right path is common to mankind.—SOPHOCLES, Antigone
    

38. Men are apt to prefer a prosperous error to an afflicted truth.—JEREMY TAYLOR
    

39. Error is the force that welds men together; truth is communicated to men only by deeds of truth.—TOLSTOY, My Religion
    

40. Error is a hardy plant: it flourisheth in every soil.—MARTIN F. TUPPER, Of Truth in Things False
    

41. There is nothing so true that the damps of error have not warped it.—MARTIN F. TUPPER
    

42. There is no error so crooked but it hath in it some lines of truth, nor is any poison so deadly that it serveth not some wholesome use. Spurn not a seeming error, but dig below its surface for the truth.—MARTIN F. TUPPER