Skip to content
quotesby

About this quote

What does it mean?
Warning that knowingly allowing a ruler to make mistakes makes you complicit in treason.
In plain terms
Helping a king make mistakes is a treasonous act.
What can you take from it?
Advisers bear responsibility for the decisions they allow.

Where it applies

  • leadership
  • politics
  • moral decision

Putting it to work

  • give honest counsel
  • accept responsibility

Questions to consider

  • When do you speak up to power?
  • How much risk do you take for truth?

Another view

It assumes all mistakes are malicious.

More from Alfonso X of Castile

  1. 'Los cantaros cuanto mas vacios, mas ruido hacen.'

    Permalink to quote #5
  2. 'Quemad viejos lenos, leed viejos libros, bebed viejos vinos, tened viejos amigos.'

    Permalink to quote #7
  3. 'Rey de las tres religiones.'

    Permalink to quote #4

Related quotes

  1. So we're arguing on the bus, and he's smoking a joint the size of a large kosher salami. Finally I got really frustrated with him, and I said, 'Look, Willie, t…

    Kinky FriedmanKinky Friedman quote #5
  2. Public life is a situation of power and energy; he trespasses against his duty who sleeps upon his watch, as well as he that goes over to the enemy.

    Edmund BurkeEdmund Burke quote #56
  3. The problem of power is how to achieve its responsible use rather than its irresponsible and indulgent use - of how to get men of power to live for the public …

    Robert F. KennedyRobert F. Kennedy quote #1