Not the truth of which any one is, or supposes himself to be, possessed, but the upright endeavor he has made to arrive at the truth, makes the worth of the man. For not by the possession but by the pursuit of truth are his powers expanded, wherein alone his ever-growing perfection consists. Possession makes us easy, indolent proud.
If God held all truth shut in his right hand, and in his left nothing but the ever-restless search after truth, although with the condition of forever and ever erring, and should say to me, “Choose!” I should bow humbly to his left hand and say, “Father, give! Pure truth is for Thee alone!”
--Gottfried Ephraim Lessing, retrieved here at page 9018.
It's a sentiment all teachers believe, and find it almost impossible to convey to their students: knowledge is an activity, not a body of results. Yet ironically, it is the students who are right. At anything short of advanced grad school (which has its own frustrations) the idea that truth is somehow elusive comes across as incompetence or a sham.
It's a sentiment also, and not least, central to Rabbinic Judaism: merely knowing Torah is not enough; it is the study of Torah, the activity every day, that is the mark of holiness.
Fn.: For an inglorious byway on the path to truth, go here.
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