Literary notes about Discernment (AI summary)
In literature, the term discernment is versatile, conveying both the keen perception of truth and the capacity to judge characters, situations, or morals with insight. Authors use it to praise a refined taste—whether in moral, aesthetic, or intellectual realms—as in reflections on a person’s ability to perceive subtle differences or hidden truths ([1], [2], [3]). It becomes a marker of wisdom and maturity in characters who can distinguish between right and wrong, or appreciate finer qualities in art and human behavior ([4], [5], [6]). In some works, the word also acquires a critical tone, suggesting that a lack of such insight leads to error or moral degradation ([7], [8], [9]). Overall, discernment is a literary device that underscores the value of perceptivity and judicious insight across different contexts and narratives ([10], [11], [12]).
- As regards ourselves our taste has not this all-important discernment.
— from Reflections; or Sentences and Moral Maxims by François duc de La Rochefoucauld - Integrity of understanding, and nicety of discernment, were not allotted in a less proportion to Dryden than to Pope.
— from The Works of Samuel Johnson, LL.D. in Nine Volumes, Volume 08 The Lives of the Poets, Volume II by Samuel Johnson - "Sir," said the Woggle-Bug, "I take you for a gentleman of judgment and discernment.
— from The Marvelous Land of Oz by L. Frank Baum - [1]—the great power of moral discernment: it is something that a man instinctively feels to be his salvation without which he were lost.
— from The Essays of Arthur Schopenhauer; Counsels and Maxims by Arthur Schopenhauer - I am now determined to stay, madam; and I have too good an opinion of my father's discernment, when he sees you, to doubt his approbation.
— from She Stoops to Conquer; Or, The Mistakes of a Night: A Comedy by Oliver Goldsmith - I complimented the woman on her fine powers of discernment.
— from The Iron Ration: Three Years in Warring Central Europe by George Abel Schreiner - And he to me: "Vain thought thou entertainest; The undiscerning life which made them sordid Now makes them unto all discernment dim.
— from Divine Comedy, Longfellow's Translation, Hell by Dante Alighieri - It requires no nice discernment or metaphysical head to mark the distinction between them.
— from An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding by David Hume - Yet what need has a being for the discernment of good and ill who neither has nor can have any ill?
— from Cicero's Tusculan Disputations by Marcus Tullius Cicero - There does not need any great Discernment to judge which are which.
— from The Declaration of Independence of the United States of America by Thomas Jefferson - OF THE BHAGAVAD-GITA, Entitled "Vijnanayog," Or "The Book of Religion by Discernment."
— from The Song Celestial; Or, Bhagavad-Gîtâ (from the Mahâbhârata) - What words add is not power of discernment or action, but a medium of intellectual exchange.
— from The Life of Reason: The Phases of Human Progress by George Santayana
