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About this quote

What does it mean?
True wisdom comes from past experience, not prediction or theory.
In plain terms
Learn from what has happened before.
What can you take from it?
Use past experience to guide future decisions.

Where it applies

  • career advice
  • life planning
  • conflict resolution

Putting it to work

  • reflect on past mistakes
  • mentor others
  • review history

Questions to consider

  • What has your experience taught you?
  • Can wisdom exist without experience?

Another view

Experience does not always guarantee accurate future predictions.

More from Alphonse de Lamartine

  1. What is our life but a succession of preludes to that unknown song whose first solemn note is sounded by death?

    Permalink to quote #6
  2. To love for the sake of being loved is human, but to love for the sake of loving is angelic.

    Permalink to quote #8
  3. Limited in his nature, infinite in his desires, man is a fallen god who remembers the heavens.

    Permalink to quote #5

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  1. All the lessons of history and experience must be lost upon us if we are content to trust alone to the peculiar advantages we happen to possess.

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  2. History teaches us that men and nations behave wisely once they have exhausted all other alternatives.

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  3. Our experience is composed rathery of illusions that of wisdom acquired.

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