Theme

Philosophy quotes about 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.

Why this theme matters

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.

In the history of philosophy

Discussions of humility travel through Greek, Chinese and Africana traditions. Compare the quotations below with their school labels rather than forcing a single definition.

Thinkers in this collection

Socrates , Epictetus , Augustine of Hippo , Michel de Montaigne , Cicero , Confucius , Talmudic tradition , Karl Popper

Frequently asked questions

What did philosophers say about humility?

They disagreed in productive ways. In this archive, Confucius, Kwame Anthony Appiah, and related voices treat humility as something to clarify, cultivate, or critique—not merely to celebrate.

Where can I find philosophy quotes about humility?

This theme page gathers 12 verified English quotations tagged Humility, with links to thinkers and sources.

How should I read quotes about humility?

Read the sentence, then check school and source. A compact line is an entry point into an argument about humility, not a substitute for the surrounding text.

  1. What I do not know, I do not claim to know.
  2. The beginning of philosophy is a consciousness of one's own weakness and inability concerning necessary things.
  3. What then is time? If no one asks me, I know; if I wish to explain it to one who asks, I do not know.
  4. What do I know?
  5. Any man can err; only a fool persists in error.
  6. The Master said: You, shall I teach you what knowing is? To know what you know, and to know what you do not know — that is true knowing.
  7. The Master said: When three people walk together, one of them is sure to be my teacher. I select what is good in them and follow it; what is not good, I correct in myself.
  8. Teach your tongue to say, “I do not know.”
  9. Our knowledge can only be finite, while our ignorance must necessarily be infinite.
  10. It is of great use to the sailor to know the length of his line, though he cannot with it fathom all the depths of the ocean.
  11. Cosmopolitans begin with a sense of one thing we all certainly share, which is our fallibility. Nobody has reason to be confident that they're right about everything.
  12. They know they don't have all the answers. They're humble enough to think that they might learn from strangers; not too humble to think that strangers can't learn from them.