Introduction:
1. May I start with a well-known and universally accepted old proverb, “Knowledge is power”. In this connection, I would also like to quote an extract from a famous speech by Abraham Lincoln, known as the father of freedom from slavery in the United States of America’s history. It reads: “With malice toward none; with charity for all, with firmness in the right.” So, with firmness, I would like to assert that “knowledge is power.” Ignorance or lack of knowledge is a shame and sin.” Well, to be free from a shame and sin in our life, we should go on learning to gain knowledge. Learning is a life-long process. “No education process is ever the end, it is always the beginning of more education, more learning, more living.” 1Knowledge and Human Resources are inseparable. “Reading makes the people developed and that the developed people go on reading.” 2
2. Well, what does investment mean? “Investment in something means the act of investing money in something.” And “invest” something in something” means to buy property, shares in a company, etc. in the hope of making a profit”.3 In connection with the topic “an investment in knowledge pays the best interest, may I mention some more writings about knowledge and education.” They know enough who know how to learn “Only the educated are free.” The more we study, the more we discover our Ignorance. And often, in the modification, the more we know, the more we don’t know. MR. Benjamin Disraeli, a famous writer, again said, “To be conscious that you are ignorant is a great step to knowledge.” 1
3. I would also like to present Myanmar proverbs and some words of wisdom, such as “on knowledge and education,” translated into English by myself, an old learner.
“In this world of ours, education, knowledge, skill, art, and craft are really our true friends.” The light of knowledge and skill is really so bright and brilliant that each and every one of us, including all of us, has to wonder about it.4 “Of the lights, firelight, moonlight and sunlight; moonlight is brighter than firelight. Sunlight is brighter than moonlight. Ah, the light of knowledge is the brightest of them all. No light is there brighter than the light of knowledge. As such, Lord Buddha has preached. Therefore, all and sundry, each and everyone should strive to acquire knowledge. Good knowledge is just like a Badeithabin tree, a tree of plenty and an inexhaustible store.5 Western scholars have also asserted that the “brain is just like a muscle”. You use it, or you lose it. So, if you want to keep your brain sharp, active and alert, go brain-jogging.” “Go brain-jogging” means read, read and read. As a matter of fact, Learning is a never-ending process. We live to learn and learn to live. A day without Learning is a day lost.” So, Let us go on learning continuously to get the best interest in our investment in knowledge.
4. In conclusion, I would like to advise you on the strength of the following words of wisdom to keep on Learning and get better every day.
• “Knowledge is not static. It accumulates and expands all the time. In the quest for knowledge there must be a strong will and perseverance.”
• “We should create a desire and dedication to update and upgrade ourselves continuously.”
• “Knowledge is power” seems to have quite a following these days.”
• “The object of education should be to increase the usefulness of man, usefulness to himself, and usefulness to others.”
Reference;
(1) A book of essential quotations Edited by Eric Partridge.
(2) U Thant, United Nations Organization Secretary-General (Retired)
(3) Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary of Current English. (Sixth Edition)
(4) ဤလောကမှာ တတ်ပညာ၊ မှန်စွာ မိတ်ကောင်းပ၊ ပညာအရောင် ထွန်းလင်းပြောင်၊ မြားမြောင်အံ့သြကြ။
(5) မီးရောင်၊ လရောင်၊ နေအရောင်၊ ဉာဏ်အရောင် လွှမ်း၍မိုး။
ပညာသမာ၊ အာဘာနတ္တိ၊ မြတ်မုနိ၊ ဟောရှိ ကျမ်းကိုကိုး။
ထို့ကြောင့်များစွာ၊ လူတကာ ပညာရအောင်ကြိုး။
ပညာကောင်းမှာ၊ ပဒေသာ၊ သုံးရာ မကုန်နိုး။
