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My intellectual horizon is infinitely wide.
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“My intellectual horizon is infinitely wide.”

Helen Keller

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Source
The World I Live In
Date
1908
Meaning

Meaning of “My intellectual horizon is infinitely wide.”

Intellectual possibility is framed as expansive because reading, thought, language, and imagination can continue enlarging a person’s world beyond immediate sensation.

Source context

Where does it come from?

The World I Live In (1908), Chapter XII, “The Larger Sanctions,” printed page 160, Project Gutenberg #27683. The sentence “My intellectual horizon is infinitely wide” immediately follows Keller’s assertion about mental vision and belongs to the same first-person philosophical defense of intellectual and imaginative range.

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BookConfidence Quotes About Ability & Self-TrustCuriosityIdentityLearning Quotes About Curiosity, Study & ExperienceMindReadingSelf TrustSelf-WorthShortIntelligence
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a man may have a great mass of knowledge, but if he has not worked it up by thinking it over for himself, it has much less value than a far smaller amount which he has thoroughly pondered.
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“a man may have a great mass of knowledge, but if he has not worked it up by thinking it over for himself, it has much less value than a far smaller amount which he has thoroughly pondered.”

Arthur Schopenhauer · The Art of Literature · 1851
Meaning & context

Accumulated information is distinguished from understanding: Schopenhauer values knowledge that has been actively compared, connected and reconsidered over a larger but unprocessed store.

Source details

The Art of Literature, section “On Thinking for Oneself,” T. Bailey Saunders translation; Project Gutenberg #10714. The library analogy immediately precedes the sentence.

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Choose what interests you.
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“Choose what interests you.”

Arnold Bennett · Mental Efficiency, and Other Hints to Men and Women · 1911
Meaning & context

Bennett recommends beginning intellectual cultivation with a subject capable of sustaining real attention instead of selecting study solely for appearance or prestige.

Source details

Mental Efficiency, discussion of reading and self-development. The short imperative belongs to Bennett’s practical advice about choosing a field for sustained personal study.

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Others form man; I only report him.
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“Others form man; I only report him.”

Michel de Montaigne · Essays of Montaigne — Book III · 1588
Meaning & context

Rather than presenting an ideal model of humanity, Montaigne describes a particular changing self and makes observation central to his method.

Source details

Essays of Montaigne, Book III, Chapter II, “Of Repentance,” Charles Cotton translation; Project Gutenberg Volume 14 #3594 / Complete Essays #3600. Montaigne distinguishes reporting a changing particular self from constructing an ideal model of humanity.

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It is not selfish to think for oneself.
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“It is not selfish to think for oneself.”

Oscar Wilde · The Soul of Man under Socialism · 1891
Meaning & context

Independent thought is distinguished from selfishness: forming one’s own judgment can protect individuality without requiring indifference to other people.

Source details

The Soul of Man under Socialism; Wilde defends individual thought while criticizing social pressure that mistakes conformity for moral virtue.

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And pause awhile from Learning to be wise;
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“And pause awhile from Learning to be wise;”

Samuel Johnson · The Vanity of Human Wishes · 1749
Meaning & context

Johnson distinguishes accumulating learning from exercising judgment, asking the scholar to interrupt pursuit of knowledge long enough to examine what wisdom requires.

Source details

The Vanity of Human Wishes (1749), first-edition scholar passage, Wikisource scan leaf 28. “And pause awhile from Learning to be wise” turns from the ambitious student’s pursuit of knowledge toward Johnson’s satirical warning that learning does not by itself remove grief, danger or error. This is eighteenth-century moral-satirical poetry after Juvenal, not a modern educational rule.

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