Oliver Wendell Jr. Holmes (1841-1935)

Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. was an American jurist who served as an associate justice of the U.S. Supreme Court from 1902 to 1932. Holmes is one of the most widely cited and influential Supreme Court justices in American history, noted for his long tenure on the Court and for his pithy opinions – particularly those on civil liberties and American constitutional democracy – and deference to the decisions of elected legislatures. Holmes retired from the Court at the age of 90, an unbeaten record for oldest justice on the Supreme Court. He previously served the Union as a brevet colonel in the American Civil War, as an associate justice and chief justice of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court, and as Weld Professor of Law at his alma mater, Harvard Law School. His positions, distinctive personality, and writing style made him a popular figure, especially with American progressives.

Quotes

A moment's insight is sometimes worth a lifetime's experience.
Fate tried to conceal him by naming him Smith.
Many ideas grow better when transplanted into another mind than in the one where they sprang up.
We should be eternally vigilant against attempts to check the expression of opinions that we loathe.
It is the province of knowledge to speak
And it is the privilege of wisdom to listen.
I find the great thing in this world is not so much where we stand, as in what direction we are moving -- we must sail sometimes with the wind and sometimes against it -- but we must sail, and not drift, nor lie at anchor.
The ultimate good desired is better reached by free trade in ideas [and] the best test of truth is the power of the thought to get itself accepted in the competition of the market.
Man's mind stretched to a new idea never goes back to its original dimensions.
I think that, as life is action and passion, it is required of a man that he should share the passion and action of his time at peril of being judged not to have lived
We are all tattooed in our cradles with the beliefs of our tribe; the record may seem superficial, but it is indelible. You cannot educate a man wholly out of superstitious fears which were implanted in his imagination, no matter how utterly his reason may reject them.
The great act of faith is when a man decides he is not God.
To know is not less than to feel.
The great thing in this world is not so much where we are, but in what direction we are moving.
A page of history is worth a pound of logic.
A new and valid idea is worth more than a regiment and fewer men can furnish the former than command the latter.
Every year, if not every day, we have to wager our salvation upon some prophecy based upon imperfect knowledge.
To live is to function. That is all there is in living.
People talk fundamentals and superlatives and then make some changes of detail.
The greatest thing in this world is not so much where we are, but in which direction we are moving.
If a man hasn't got plenty of good common sense, the more science he has the worse for his patient.