The Wise Listen

     One fool can ask a question that a thousand wise men cannot answer. What one fool spoils, a thousand wise men cannot repair.
— Torat he-Kenaot, p. 42; Bet Jonathan, p. 8,
in The Talmudic Anthology, Newman/Spitz (eds.), p. 129.

     The only thing to do with an idiot and a thorn is to get rid of them.
— Shemat Rabbah, 6, 5, in Ibid., p. 129.

     The wise man knows at the commencement of a matter what its end will be.
— Y. Sotah, 5 (end), in Ibid., p. 133.

     For two and a half years the schools of Shammai and Hillel argued the question, and finally decided by majority vote that it were better for man not to have been created. Inasmuch, however, as he was created, he must closely scrutinize his doings.
— Erubin, 13, in Ibid., p. 258.

....One day on the road he saw a man planting a carob tree. He said to him: "A carob tree brings forth no fruit for seventy years. Are you certain that you will be live for seventy years?"
     The man replied: "Did I find the world empty? As my fathers have planted for me, I am planting for my children."
— Makkot, 23, in Ibid., p. 285.

.... If one man says to thee: "Thou art a donkey," do not mind; if two speak thus, purchase a saddle for thyself.
— Bereshit, R., 45, 10, in Ibid., p. 354.

     R. Ilai said in the name of R. Eleazar ben R. Simeon: "It is just as much a Mitzwah for a man not to rebuke when he is certain it will do no good, as it is for him to offer rebuke when it will be accepted."
— Yebamot, 65, in Ibid., p. 381.

     The motto of Hillel: "If I am not for myself, who is for me? And when I am for myself only, what am I? And if not now, when? (Abbot 1:14) is in the spirit of the commandment: "Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself."
     A sound morality must take account of our own interest equally with the interest of others.
— Moore, "Judaism," ii, 86, in Ibid., p. 423.

     The stone fell on the pitcher? Woe to the pitcher. The pitcher fell on the stone? Woe to the pitcher.
— Esther Rabbah, 7:10, in Ibid., p. 434.

     The Sage said: "It is not thy duty to complete the work, but neither art thou free to desist from it."
— Abot, 2, 21, in Ibid., p. 501.

     A sigh breaks half the body.
— Berakot, 58, in Ibid., p. 552.