Quotes about Growth

Student is not a container you have to fill but a torch you have to light up.

It is, in fact, nothing short of a miracle that the modern methods of instruction have not yet entirely strangled the holy curiosity of inquiry; for this delicate little plant, aside from stimulation, stands mainly in need of freedom. Without this it goes to wrack and ruin without fail.

The only source of knowledge is experience.

Creating a new theory is not like destroying an old barn and erecting a skyscraper in its place. It is rather like climbing a mountain, gaining new and wider views, discovering unexpected connections between our starting points and its rich environment. But the point from which we started out still exists and can be seen, although it appears smaller and forms a tiny part of our broad view gained by the mastery of the obstacles on our adventurous way up.

No one does anything right in life, until they realize that they are making a mistake

It is our American habit if we find the foundations of our educational structure unsatisfactory to add another story or wing.

Education is not the learning of facts, but the training of the mind to think.

A ship is always safe at the shore, but that is not what it is built for.

Growth comes through analogy; through seeing how things connect, rather than only seeing how they might be different.

Every theory is killed sooner or later in that way. But if the theory has good in it, that good is embodied and continued in the next theory.

In the middle of difficulty lies opportunity.

There is only one road to human greatness: through the school of hard knocks.