It is a thousand times better to have common sense without education than to have education without common sense.

Ingersoll contrasts practical judgment (“common sense”) with formal schooling (“education”), arguing that knowledge and credentials are hollow if they are not guided by clear reasoning, prudence, and an ability to apply ideas to real life. The hyperbole (“a thousand times better”) underscores a moral and civic point common in his rhetoric: intellectual authority should be tested by its usefulness and humanity, not merely by institutional validation. The line also reflects a democratic suspicion of pretension—warning that education can amplify folly when it supplies tools and confidence without wisdom. Read this way, the quote is less anti-education than pro-judgment: learning is valuable, but only when anchored in sound sense.