In this post, we’re exploring some of the most insightful Benjamin Jowett quotes who was a renowned scholar, theologian, and teacher, and was one of the most influential thinkers of the 19th century.
Benjamin Jowett, was best known for his translations of Plato, his work in education reform, and his deep thoughts on leadership, learning, and human nature. He studied at Balliol College, Oxford, where he later became Master and helped shape the university’s approach to teaching and scholarship. He was admired for his wisdom, fairness, and ability to challenge conventional thinking.
Let’s read some of the most thought-provoking Benjamin Jowett quotes on education, success and more.
Best Benjamin Jowett Quotes
1. “Young men make great mistakes in life; for one thing, they idealize love too much.”
2. “To do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourself, is the mark of true leadership.”
3. “A single question honestly asked is worth more than a hundred answers assumed.”
4. “Research! A mere excuse for idleness; it has never achieved, and will never achieve any results of the slightest value.”
5. “Act as if everything depended on you; trust as if everything depended on God.”
6. “My dear child, you must believe in God despite what the clergy tells you.”
7. “The true use of interpretation is to get rid of interpretation and leave us alone in company with the author.”
8. “To deny doubt is to deny reason; to embrace it is to begin the journey toward understanding.”
Inspirational Benjamin Jowett Quotes
1. “The real measure of our wealth is how much we’d be worth if we lost all our money.”
2. “Doubt comes in at the window when inquiry is denied at the door.”
3. “The mean is always best, for it avoids excess and deficiency.”
4. “Nowhere probably is there more true feeling, and nowhere worse taste, than in a churchyard.”
5. “Plato’s dialogues bear at least some similarities to the classical plays.”
6. “There is a great deal of hard lying in the world; especially among people whose characters are above suspicion.”
7. “Give the clergy your sympathy; don’t give them anything else.”
8. “All translation is a compromise – the effort to be literal and the effort to be idiomatic.”
9. “Teaching is not a lost art, but the regard for it is a lost tradition.”
10. “Man is by nature a political animal.”
11. “The letter killeth, but the spirit giveth life.”
Benjamin Jowett Quotes on Success
1. “Never retreat. Never explain. Get it done and let them howl.”
2. “The way to get things done is not to mind who gets the credit for doing them.”
3. “You’ve got to be success minded. You’ve got to feel that things are coming your way when you’re out selling; otherwise, you won’t be able to sell anything.”
4. “The achievements which society rewards are won at the cost of diminution of personality.”
5. “It is most important in this world to be pushing, but it is fatal to seem so.”
6. “Precautions are always blamed. When successful they are said to be unnecessary.”
7. “There is a serious defect in the thinking of someone who wants – more than anything else – to become rich. As long as they don’t have the money, it’ll seem like a worthwhile goal. Once they do, they’ll understand how important other things are – and have always been.”
Benjamin Jowett Quotes on Faith
1. “It is a dangerous thing to wrap up our faith in mystery, as if God had enjoined us to contradict reason and common sense.”
2. “Faith and reason are not at war, but are meant to walk together hand in hand.”
3. “Great ideas travel slowly, and for a time noiselessly, as the gods whose feet were shod with wool.”
4. “Atheism or similar charges was not unusual among intellectuals, nor condemned by the masses. The prize-winning plays of Aristophanes were not merely atheist, but made fun of the gods and their prophets and oracles.”
5. “The spirit of inquiry should pervade religion as it does all other fields of knowledge.”
6. “There is a voice in the human heart that continually calls for a higher and more spiritual religion.”
7. “Every age must discover its own Christianity.”
8. “No prophecy of scripture is of any private interpretation; it must be understood in the context of its time and place.”
9. “I am not blaming the past. … But I want the peace of God to settle on the future.”
10. “Scripture has one meaning—the meaning which it had to the mind of the Prophet or Evangelist who first uttered or wrote it, to the hearers or readers who first received it.”
11. “Grace is an energy; not a mere sentiment; not a mere thought of the Almighty; not even a word of the Almighty. It is as real an energy as the energy of electricity. It is a divine energy; it is the energy of the divine affection rolling in plenteousness toward the shores of human need.”
Benjamin Jowett Quotes on Education
1. “We must not count education by what is remembered, but by what is understood and made a part of life.”
2. “One man is as good as another until he has written a book.”
3. “The chief difference between us and them (the ancient Greeks) is, that they were slowly learning what we are in process of forgetting.”
4. “To teach a man how he may learn to grow independently, and for himself, is perhaps the greatest service that one man can do another.”
5. “We cannot seek or attain health, wealth, learning, justice or kindness in general. Action is always specific, concrete, individualized, unique.”
Benjamin Jowett Quotes on Logic & Truths
1. “Religion is a thing of the heart more than the head, of life more than logic.”
2. “Logic is neither a science nor an art, but a dodge.”
3. “The highest truths are not those which admit of proof, but those which can be acted upon.”
4. “Truth is not established by the repetition of doctrines but by the openness of the mind to fresh light.”
5. “The highest truth is not what passes current among men, but the eternal principles of right and good.”
Benjamin Jowett’s quotes remind us of the power of knowledge, the importance of character, and the value of independent thinking. His main motive was to encourage his students to keep learning, question deeply, and lead with integrity.
Which of these Benjamin Jowett quotes is your favorite?
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