Fight for your opinions, but do not believe that they contain the whole truth or the only truth.

Fight for your opinions, but do not believe that they contain the whole truth or the only truth.

One often contradicts an opinion when what is uncongenial is really the tone in which it was conveyed.

One often contradicts an opinion when what is uncongenial is really the tone in which it was conveyed.

Private opinion is weak, but public opinion is almost omnipotent.

Private opinion is weak, but public opinion is almost omnipotent.

As a leader... I have always endeavored to listen to what each and every person in a discussion had to read more

As a leader... I have always endeavored to listen to what each and every person in a discussion had to say before venturing my own opinion. Oftentimes, my own opinion will simply represent a con-sensus of what I heard in the discussion. I always remember the axiom: a leader is like a shepherd. He stays behind the flock, letting the most nimble go out ahead, whereupon the others follow, not realizing that all along they are being directed from behind.

Opinions founded on prejudice are always sustained with the greatest violence.

Opinions founded on prejudice are always sustained with the greatest violence.

One can give a really unbiased opinion only about things that do not interest one

One can give a really unbiased opinion only about things that do not interest one

For having lived long, I have experienced many instances of being obliged, by better information or fuller consideration, to change read more

For having lived long, I have experienced many instances of being obliged, by better information or fuller consideration, to change opinions, even on important subjects, which I once thought right but found to be otherwise.

Opinions have vested interests just as men have.

Opinions have vested interests just as men have.

The peculiar evil of silencing the expression of an opinion is that it is robbing the human race; posterity as read more

The peculiar evil of silencing the expression of an opinion is that it is robbing the human race; posterity as well as the existing generation; those who dissent from the opinion, still more than those who hold it. If the opinion is right, they are deprived of the opportunity of exchanging error for truth: if wrong, they lose, what is almost as great a benefit, the clearer perception and livelier impression of truth, produced by its collision with error.