An ornate gold mirror displays a pale jester's cap above draped ivory fabric and small gold objects.

Original artwork, not a still

Don Herold

There is nobody so irritating as somebody with less intelligence and more sense than we have.

Behind the line

What it means

Our interpretation.

The speaker finds few things more maddening than a person who is less clever than they are yet has better judgment. The irritation carries a hint of self-mockery: being outdone in sense by someone lesser in intelligence stings because it exposes the speaker's own cleverness as no guarantee of wisdom.

Context reviewed

Share this quote