Can we unlearn the arts that pretend to civilize, and then burn the world?

If, in short, our children could spend two years in a good kindergarten, they would not only bring to the school those elements of knowledge which are required, but would have learned in some degree how to learn, and, in the measure of their progress, have nothing to unlearn.

The kindergarten aims in no way at making infant prodigies, but it aims successfully at putting the little child in possession of every faculty he is capable of using; at bringing him forward on lines he will never need to forsake; at teaching within his narrow range what he will never have to unlearn; and at giving him the wish to learn, and the power of teaching himself.

Leonardo Donato had been in possession of the supreme ducal authority but a few weeks, not long enough to unlearn the tone of command and the quick power of decision which had distinguished him as ambassador, when he had been chosen with the unanimous approval of this august assembly, to conciliate the court of Rome in the hour of the Republic's great emergency.

There was Aristoteles, a very distinguished writer, of whom you have heard,a philosopher, in short, whom it took centuries to learn, centuries to unlearn, and is now going to take a generation or more to learn over again.

They have so much to unlearn: children and working men have so little.

This much was to my advantage; I learned none of that deceitful rubbish taught in schools, and so had nothing to unlearn when I awakened to my true lovemathematics, higher mathematics and higher geometry.

[cause oneself to forget] unlearn; efface &c 552, discharge from the memory; consign to oblivion, consign to the tomb of the Capulets; think no more of &c (turn the attention from) 458; cast behind one's back, wean one's thoughts from; let bygones be bygones &c (forgive) 918.

To unlearn the evil was the answer, according to Diogenes Laertius, Antisthenes gave, when he was asked what branch of knowledge was most necessary; and we can see what he meant.

They do not pin the reader to a dogma, which he must afterwards discover to be inexact; they do not teach him a lesson, which he must afterwards unlearn.

Certainly the true End of visiting Foreign Parts, is to look into their Customs and Policies, and observe in what Particulars they excel or come short of our own; to unlearn some odd Peculiarities in our Manners, and wear off such awkward Stiffnesses and Affectations in our Behaviour, as may possibly have been contracted from constantly associating with one Nation of Men, by a more free, general, and mixed Conversation.

I can't help thinking when I see them how glad I am that my sons are better employed at Andover than beating the streets or drums; that they are laying in a good store of useful knowledge against the time to come, while these poor boys, many of them, at least, are learning what they will be glad by and by to unlearn.

The old are too old to learn, or, rather, to unlearn what have been the habits of their lives.

Not yet have I, in sooth, my freedom wrought; Could I my pathway but from magic free, And quite unlearn the spells of sorcery, Stood I, oh nature, man alone 'fore thee, Then were it worth the trouble man to be!

He has after all, and it is not the least nor lowest item in his praise, been the severest of his own critics, and has not been too proud either to learn or to unlearn in the work of maturing his genius and building up his fame.

If Marian ever learns thatwhich she may, although I am neither able nor willing to teach it to hershe will not thank those who gave her so much falsehood to unlearn.

You will have to unlearn those little 'plain dinners' and makeshifts of yours.

"'How much would it cost to unlearn it?'

Wherefore, in Galileo's time, we might have helped to proscribe, or to burnhad he been stubborn enough to warrant cremationeven the great pioneer of inductive research; although, when we had fairly recovered our composure, and had leisurely excogitated the matter, we might have come to conclude that the new doctrine was better than the old one, after all, at least for those who had nothing to unlearn.

Certainly the true End of visiting Foreign Parts, is to look into their Customs and Policies, and observe in what Particulars they excel or come short of our own; to unlearn some odd Peculiarities in our Manners, and wear off such awkward Stiffnesses and Affectations in our Behaviour, as may possibly have been contracted from constantly associating with one Nation of Men, by a more free, general, and mixed Conversation.

This doctrine it is, that so often makes men atheists in Spain, and profligates in England, as soon as they unlearn the national creed: and the school which have done the mischief, moralize over the wickedness of human nature when it comes to pass instead of blaming the falsehood which they have themselves inculcated.

Therefore suffer me, while I try to draw you forth from those pleasant retreats, which it has been our blessedness hitherto to enjoy, to contemplate the condition and prospects of our Holy Mother in a practical way; so that one and all may unlearn that idle habit, which has grown upon us, of owning the state of things to be bad, yet doing nothing to remedy it. Consider a moment.

It is true their tendency is to teach, to cultivate: but in art there is too often as much to unlearn as to learn, and the unlearning is the more irksome task; prejudice, self-gratulation, have removed the humility which is the first step in the ladder of advancement.

At every stage of the building process it was necessary to check, to question, to evaluate, unlearn, tear down, make a new start.

We are not bound by old traditions, we have few prejudices to unlearn, and we are able to see merit in more than one school.