The latter part of a wise person's life is occupied with curing the follies, prejudices and false opinions they contracted earlier.'
About this quote
- What does it mean?
- A wise person spends later life correcting mistakes made in youth.
- In plain terms
- Wisdom involves fixing past errors and biases.
- What can you take from it?
- Self-improvement is a lifelong task.
Where it applies
Putting it to work
Questions to consider
- What errors do you correct?
- Is wisdom just undoing mistakes?
Another view
Not everyone has the capacity or desire to correct past follies.
More from Jonathan Swift
It is useless to attempt to reason a man out of a thing he was never reasoned into.
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