Source identified
“What the superior man seeks, is in himself. What the mean man seeks, is in others.”
Mature judgment begins with one’s own conduct and capacities rather than making other people the first explanation for every outcome.
Source note: The Analects of Confucius, James Legge’s public-domain English translation; Book XV contrasts inward self-examination with dependence on others.
Source identified
“Sweet are the uses of adversity.”
Voice: Fictional character · Duke Senior
Adversity is presented as capable of yielding insight or value even when the experience itself is unwelcome.
Source note: As You Like It, Act 2, Scene 1; Duke Senior reflects on what adversity can reveal while living in exile.
Source identified
“To err is human; to forgive, divine.”
Error is treated as ordinary human limitation, while forgiveness requires an additional act of generosity.
Source note: An Essay on Criticism, Part II; Pope warns that shallow learning can produce premature confidence before deeper study tempers judgment.
Source identified
“We know what we are, but know not what we may be.”
Voice: Fictional character · Ophelia
The line leaves room between present identity and future possibility, making it useful for reflection on change and potential.
Source note: Hamlet, Act 4, Scene 5; Ophelia speaks during her disrupted state, so the line remains dramatic dialogue rather than Shakespearean autobiography.
Source identified
“The road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom.”
The proverb provocatively suggests that excess can teach limits through direct experience, though it is not a simple instruction to pursue excess.
Source note: The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, “Proverbs of Hell”; Blake presents the line as a deliberately paradoxical aphorism about experience and limits.
Source identified
“Experience is merely the name men gave to their mistakes.”
Voice: Narrator voice · Narrator, focalized through Lord Henry
The wit turns “experience” into a retrospective label for errors, suggesting that mistakes become useful only when understood.
Source note: The Picture of Dorian Gray, 1891 edition, Chapter 4; third-person narration focalized through Lord Henry reflects that experience is the name people give to their mistakes.