Q0100

“Any man can err; only a fool persists in error.” — Cicero (Philippics XII.5)

Verified English quotation. Primary source: Philippics XII.5. Theme: humility.

English

Any man can err; only a fool persists in error.
Thinker Cicero
School Stoicism
Source Philippics XII.5
Theme Humility
Another quotation More from this thinker

Source and attribution

The archive attributes this English wording to Philippics XII.5 and files it under Stoicism. That locator distinguishes the passage from loose internet attributions: readers can return to the named work or section to check translation, surrounding argument, and edition-specific wording.

About Cicero

Marcus Tullius Cicero (106–43 BCE) was Rome’s greatest orator and a statesman who transmitted Greek philosophy into Latin prose. Caught in the Republic’s death throes, he opposed Caesar’s assassins’ enemies and was killed in the proscriptions.

How to read this passage

Across 4 recurring voices here (notably Confucius and Kwame Anthony Appiah), humility is framed through Stoicism and Confucianism. Some passages define humility; others warn how it fails; still others relocate it inside habit, community, or language. This passage enters that discussion through humility.

Concepts in this quote

Humility
Humility appears in this archive as a live philosophical concern—not a slogan. These verified English passages show how thinkers treat humility as a problem of judgment, practice, or explanation.

How to cite this quotation

APA: Cicero. (n.d.). Any man can err; only a fool persists in error. In Philosophy Blind Box. https://www.philosophydef.com/quotes/q0100

MLA: Cicero. “Any man can err; only a fool persists….” Philosophy Blind Box, https://www.philosophydef.com/quotes/q0100.

Chicago: Cicero. “Any man can err; only a fool persists….” Philosophy Blind Box. Accessed 2026. https://www.philosophydef.com/quotes/q0100.

Frequently asked questions

What is the source of the quotation “Any man can err; only a fool persists…”?

The passage is attributed to Cicero, Philippics XII.5. The archive attributes this English wording to Philippics XII.5 and files it under Stoicism. That locator distinguishes the passage from loose internet attributions: readers can return to the named work or section to check translation, surrounding argument, and edition-specific wording.

What does Cicero mean by humility?

Across 4 recurring voices here (notably Confucius and Kwame Anthony Appiah), humility is framed through Stoicism and Confucianism. Some passages define humility; others warn how it fails; still others relocate it inside habit, community, or language. This passage enters that discussion through humility.

Same thinker

More from Cicero

  1. Philosophy is the cultivation of the soul.
  2. We are not born for ourselves alone.
  3. Friendship cannot exist except among the good.
  4. The best weapons of old age are the arts and practices of the virtues.

All quotations by Cicero

Same theme

More on humility

  1. It is through wonder that people both now begin and first began to philosophize.
  2. A person's character is their destiny.
  3. What is opposed brings together; from what differs comes the finest harmony.
  4. Death is nothing to us: for what has been dissolved has no sensation, and what has no sensation is nothing to us.
  5. Pleasure is the beginning and end of the happy life — not the pleasures of profligates, but freedom from pain in the body and from disturbance in the soul.

Browse the humility theme