Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr.? Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.? Albert Einstein? Ralph Waldo Emerson?
Question for Quote Investigator: Encountering a novel idea or sensation causes changes that permanently alter one’s intellect. This notion can be expressed as follows:
A mind that is stretched by a new idea or experience can never shrink back to its old dimensions.
Attempting to trace this saying is confusing because the phrasing is highly mutable. The adage has been attributed to physician Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr., jurist Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr., physicist Albert Einstein, and philosopher Ralph Waldo Emerson. I have not been able to find solid citation using the original phrasing. Would you please help me?
Reply from Quote Investigator: The earliest match known to QI appeared in the September 1858 issue of “The Atlantic Monthly” of Boston, Massachusetts within a recurring column called “The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table” written by Oliver Wendell Holmes, Senior. Holmes’s mind was expanded when he saw a majestic mountain range. Boldface added to excerpts by QI:1
Every man of reflection is vaguely conscious of an imperfectly-defined circle which is drawn about his intellect. He has a perfectly clear sense that the fragments of his intellectual circle include the curves of many other minds of which he is cognizant. He often recognizes these as manifestly concentric with his own, but of less radius. On the other hand, when we find a portion of an arc outside of our own, we say it intersects ours, but are very slow to confess or to see that it circumscribes it.
Every now and then a man’s mind is stretched by a new idea or sensation, and never shrinks back to its former dimensions. After looking at the Alps, I felt that my mind had been stretched beyond the limits of its elasticity, and fitted so loosely on my old ideas of space that I had to spread these to fit it.
QI believes Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr. should receive credit for this adage. The variant phrasings evolved from Holmes’s initial expression. The attributions to Albert Einstein and Ralph Waldo Emerson appeared many decades after 1858 and are unsupported.
Here is a sampling of the different versions of the saying together with dates and attributions:
1858 Sep: Every now and then a man’s mind is stretched by a new idea or sensation, and never shrinks back to its former dimensions. (Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr.)
1895 Oct: A man’s mind now and then is stretched by a new idea and does not afterward shrink to its former dimensions. (Attributed to Oliver Wendell Holmes)
1949 Sep: Man’s mind once stretched to a new idea will never return to its former dimensions. (Attributed to Oliver Wendell Holmes)
1949 Oct: A man’s mind once stretched to a new idea never quite returns to its original size. (Attributed to Oliver Wendell Holmes)
1957: The mind, once stretched, never returns to its original size. (Anonymous)
1959: A man’s mind stretched by a new idea can never go back to its original dimensions. (Attributed to Oliver Wendell Holmes)
1960: A stretched mind never returns to its original dimension. (Anonymous)
1961: A man’s mind, once stretched by an idea, can never return to its original size. (Anonymous)
1967: Sometimes a person’s mind is stretched by a new idea and never does go back to its old dimensions. (Attributed to Oliver Wendell Holmes)
1980: The mind, once expanded to the dimension of larger ideas, never returns to its original size. (Attributed to Oliver Wendell Holmes)
1998: A mind once stretched by new thoughts can never regain its original shape. (Attributed to Albert Einstein)
2006: The mind, once stretched by a new idea, never returns to its original dimensions. (Attributed to Ralph Waldo Emerson)
2008: A mind exposed to a new idea never shrinks back to its original size. (Attributed to Albert Einstein)
2009: The mind that opens to a new idea never goes back to its original size. (Attributed to Albert Einstein)
Below are details for selected citations in chronological order.
In 1858 the columns by Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr. were collected and printed as a book under the title “The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table”:2
Every now and then a man’s mind is stretched by a new idea or sensation, and never shrinks back to its former dimensions.
In 1890 the remark appeared in the collection “Two Thousand and Ten Choice Quotations in Poetry and Prose From the Master Minds of All Ages” compiled by Thomas W. Handford:3
The Power of a New Thought.
Every now and then a man’s mind is stretched by a new idea or sensation, and never shrinks back to its former dimensions. O. W. Holmes.
In 1895 Thomas Messinger Drown, President of Lehigh University in Pennsylvania, delivered an address during the school’s Founder’s Day. Drown employed a version of the saying:4
Holmes has somewhere happily said that a man’s mind now and then is stretched by a new idea and does not afterward shrink to its former dimensions. This is the case with the youth when he becomes conscious of the power enabling him to penetrate into the very heart of nature and discover her laws.
In September 1949 a newspaper in Twin Falls, Idaho reported on a speech delivered by John Flatt, the local high school principal, who used a version of the adage. Flatt credited Oliver Wendell Holmes which was an ambiguous name in 1949 because both Senior and Junior were prominent by that time:5
He concluded with a quotation from Oliver Wendell Holmes, “Man’s mind once stretched to a new idea will never return to its former dimensions.”
In December 1949 “The Wichita Sunday Eagle” of Kansas printed an advertisement from a realtor which contained another instance of the saying:6
That great philosopher, Oliver Wendell Holmes once said, “A man’s mind once stretched to a new idea never quite returns to its original size.” Listen, Mister! you should be stretching your mind to the idea of owning a home for your family’s pleasure and better living.
In 1957 a columnist in the “Altoona Tribune” of Pennsylvania published a compact version of the adage without attribution:7
“the mind, once stretched, never returns to its original size.” . . . “once knew a lady so used to having her own way, she could write her diary two weeks in advance!”
In 1959 “The Beacon” of Lake Charles, Louisiana printed an instance as a filler item:8
A man’s mind stretched by a new idea can never go back to its original dimensions.
— Oliver Wendell Holmes
In 1960 a columnist in “The St. Bernard Voice” of Arabi, Louisiana published an instance without attribution:9
A stretched mind never returns to its original dimension. Do you learn a new word each day?
In 1961 a high school journalism club in Watonga, Oklahoma published a piece containing the following anonymous instance:10
“A man’s mind, once stretched by an idea, can never return to its original size.”
In 1962 an article in a Pottstown, Pennsylvania newspaper contained the following version:11
The mind, in a way, is elastic. Once stretched with a new idea, it can never return to its original size.
In 1967 a columnist in Maryville, Missouri published an instance with “a person’s mind” instead of “a man’s mind”:12
Oliver Wendell Holmes once said, “Sometimes a person’s mind is stretched by a new idea and never does go back to its old dimensions.”
In 1980 an advertisement for National Training Corporation of South Bend, Indiana contained the following:13
“The mind, once expanded to the dimension of larger ideas, never returns to its original size . . . .”
Oliver Wendell Holmes
In 1998 a message posted to the Usenet newsgroup alt.quotations attributed a version of the saying to Albert Einstein:14
Lou Albert writes:
>”A mind once stretched by new thoughts can never regain its original shape.”
> -Albert Einstein
In 2006 the saying appeared with an attribution to Ralph Waldo Emerson in the book “Reading Power: Teaching Students to Think While They Read”:15
“The mind, once stretched by a new idea, never returns to its original dimensions.”
— Ralph Waldo Emerson
A tweet in 2008 credited Einstein with another version of the saying. The word “it’s” should have been “its”:16
@obyri Einstein once said “A mind exposed to a new idea never shrinks back to it’s original size.”
A tweet in 2009 credited Einstein with yet another instance. The word “it’s” should have been “its”:17
“The mind that opens to a new idea Never comes back to it’s original size” — Einstein
In conclusion, Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr. deserves credit for the statement he wrote in 1858. The incorrect attribution to Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. was probably caused by the ambiguity of the name without a suffix. The mistaken attributions to Albert Einstein and Ralph Waldo Emerson appeared only in recent decades.
Image Notes: Painting of “The Schmadribach Falls” by Joseph Anton Koch circa 1822. This waterfall is located in the Swiss Alps. Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr. mentioned the mental changes he experienced when viewing the Alps to help explicate his adage.
Acknowledgements: Great thanks to Christopher Powell, Carolyn Haley, Penny Richards, David J. Haskell, Alessandra Lopez, and Michael Tyler whose inquiries led QI to formulate this question and perform this exploration. Also, thanks to researcher Ralph Keyes who pointed to the 1858 citation in his valuable book “The Quote Verifier”. Additional thanks to participants on the Project Wombat mailing list: Carolyn Haley, Fred W. Helenius, and Sue W.
Update History: On April 12, 2024 the format of the bibliographical notes was updated. Also, the full article was placed on this website.
- 1858 September, The Atlantic Monthly, The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table: Every Man His Own Boswell, by Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr., Start Page 496, Quote Page 502, Column 1, Ticknor and Fields, Boston, Massachusetts. (Google Books Full View) link ↩︎
- 1858, The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table by Oliver Wendell Holmes, Quote Page 311, Phillips, Sampson and Company, Boston, Massachusetts. (HathiTrust Full View) link ↩︎
- 1890, Two Thousand and Ten Choice Quotations in Poetry and Prose From the Master Minds of All Ages, Compiled by Thomas W. Handford, Fifth Edition, Date: May Thirteenth, Quote Page 138, Belford-Clarke Company, Chicago, Illinois. (Google Books Full View) link ↩︎
- 1895, The Educational Value of Engineering Studies, An Address Delivered on Founder’s Day, October 10, 1895 by Thomas Messinger Drown, President of Lehigh University, Quote Page 17, Published by Lehigh University, Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. (Google Books Full View) link ↩︎
- 1949 September 9, Times-News, Teachers Are Guests of Businessmen; 300 People Attend ‘Welcome’ Banquet, Quote Page 1, Column 7, Twin Falls, Idaho. (Newspapers_com) ↩︎
- 1949 December 18, The Wichita Sunday Eagle, Advertisement Title: Real Estate Today, Advertisement for Realtor: Art Roskam, Quote Page 6B, Column 9, Wichita, Kansas. (Newspapers_com) ↩︎
- 1957 October 31, Altoona Tribune, Bellwood News by Lois Hahn Ramsey, Quote Page 9, Column 1, Altoona, Pennsylvania. (Newspapers_com) ↩︎
- 1959 October 30, The Beacon, (Untitled filler item), Quote Page 4, Column 4, Lake Charles, Louisiana. (Newspapers_com) ↩︎
- 1960 February 26, The St. Bernard Voice, Acorns by Lyle Linch, Quote Page 5, Column 3, Arabi, Louisiana. (Newspapers_com) ↩︎
- 1961 November 30, The Watonga Republican, The Arrowhead, Published Weekly by the Journalism Club of Watonga High School, (Filler item without attribution), Quote Page 7, Column 3, Watonga, Oklahoma. (Newspapers_com) ↩︎
- 1962 September 14, Pottstown Mercury, Never Too Late, Quote Page 4, Column 1, Pottstown, Pennsylvania. (Newspapers_com) ↩︎
- 1967 April 18, Maryville Daily Forum, Between the Platte and Nodaway by Lucille Wyman, Quote Page 5, Column 4 and 5, Maryville, Missouri. (Newspapers_com) ↩︎
- 1980 June 1, Minneapolis Tribune, Advertisement Title: Successful Selling, Advertisement Company: National Training Corp. of South Bend, Indiana, Quote Page 10A, Column 3, Minneapolis, Minnesota. (Newspapers_com) ↩︎
- Usenet discussion message, Timestamp: Mar 18, 1998, 3:00:00 AM, Newsgroup: alt.quotations, From: MECOMAN, Subject: good. (Google Groups Search; Accessed March 28, 2023) link ↩︎
- 2006, Reading Power: Teaching Students to Think While They Read by Adrienne Gear, Section: Introduction, Quote Page 9, Pembroke Publishers Limited, Markham, Ontario, Canada. (Google Books Full View) ↩︎
- Tweet, From: anocelot @anocelot, Time: 10:15 AM, Date: Oct 4, 2008, Text: Einstein once said “A mind exposed to a new idea never…” (Accessed on twitter.com on March 28, 2023) link ↩︎
- Tweet, From: julian reid @JulianReid, Time: 2:42 PM, Date: Jan 12, 2009, Text: The mind that opens to a new idea… (Accessed on twitter.com on March 29, 2023) link ↩︎