  In this paper I address the difference between knowledge-inquiry and
wisdom-inquiry (concepts introduced by N. Maxwell) in nuclear physics
education, specifically in senior-level textbooks for first-degree physics
students. Following on from an earlier study of 57 such textbooks, I focus here
on a remarkable use of literary quotations in one of them. The nuclear physics
textbook Particles and Nuclei: an Introduction to the Physical Concepts, by B.
Povh et al opens with a (German) quotation from Max und Moritz which has been
rendered, in the celebrated translation by C. T. Brooks, as "Not alone to solve
the double/ Rule of Three shall man take trouble;/ But must hear with pleasure
Sages/ Teach the wisdom of the ages." What the student gets however is
technical material followed abruptly at the very end by the advice (from The
Book of Jeremiah) "And it shall be, when thou hast made an end of reading this
book, that thou shalt bind a stone to it, and cast it into the midst of
Euphrates". From a study of these and other quotations and other features of
this book I infer a strong desire to express something important about wisdom,
which is however even more powerfully suppressed by the ideology of
knowledge-inquiry. At the end of this paper I discuss briefly wisdom of the
ages and wisdom for our age.
