Meaning of “Iron sharpeneth iron; so a man sharpeneth the…”

Of Studies; Bacon distinguishes the intellectual uses of reading, conversation, and writing within the essay’s compact account of study and judgment.

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.

The Advancement of Learning, First Book, Project Gutenberg #5500, transcribed from the 1893 Cassell & Company edition. Bacon contrasts impatience of doubt with mature suspension of judgment and then sets out two ways of contemplation before saying that beginning with certainties ends in doubts while beginning with doubts can end in certainties. It remains early-modern epistemological argument rather than a modern experimental rule for scientific method.

An Essay on Criticism, Part III; Pope joins good nature and good sense before contrasting ordinary human error with the higher moral act of forgiveness.

Walden, chapter “Reading,” in the discussion of books that can reveal new possibilities and answer enduring questions.

Thoughts on the Education of Daughters (1787), “THE BENEFITS WHICH ARISE FROM DISAPPOINTMENTS,” printed page 111, Project Gutenberg #67466. Wollstonecraft says reflection forms habits and fixes principles while opening a religious-moral discussion of disappointment, self-examination and character.