Popular Wisdom Quotes

A proverb is one man’s wit and all men’s wisdom.

If I can't find a way to love it, I let it go. Kind of the opposite of the popular homily.

Where an opinion is general, it is usually correct.

A year at the breast is quite enough; children who are suckled longer are said to grow stupid, and I am all for popular sayings.

Free government is the most difficult of all government. But it is everlastingly true that the plain people will make fewer mistakes than any other group of men, no matter how powerful.

The charge is often made against the intelligentsia and other members of the anointed that their theories and the policies based on them lack common sense. But the very commonness of common sense makes it unlikely to have any appeal to the anointed. How can they be wiser and nobler than everyone else while agreeing with everyone else?

The proverbial wisdom of the populace in the street, on the roads, and in the markets instructs the ear of him who studies man more fully than a thousand rules ostentatiously displayed.

We believe in the common sense of the common people.

Don’t underestimate the common sense of the American people. You do so at your jeopardy.

I don't turn to greeting cards for wisdom and advice, but they are a fine reflection of the general drift of the culture.

I remember confuting one of Westminster's favourite maxims, "better the devil you know than the devil you don't". In the annals of popular wisdom, this is one of the most cretinous sayings I have come across.

The most familiar precepts are not always the truest.

Proverbs may not improperly be called the philosophy of the common people.

I am persuaded myself that the good sense of the people will always be found to be the best army. They may be led astray for a moment, but will soon correct themselves. The people are the only censors of their governors; and even their errors will tend to keep these to the true principles of their institution.

Anyone will be glad to admit that he knows nothing about beagling, or the Chinese stock market, or ballistics, but there is not a man or woman alive who does not claim to know how to cure hiccoughs.