TRUTH QUOTES VIII

quotations about truth

Pure truth, like pure gold, has been found unfit for circulation, because men have discovered that it is far more convenient to adulterate the truth, than to refine themselves.

CHARLES CALEB COLTON

Lacon


You have noticed that truth comes into this world with two faces. One is sad with suffering, and the other laughs; but it is the same face, laughing or weeping.

NICHOLAS BLACK ELK

Black Elk Speaks

Tags: Nicholas Black Elk


And the truth must finally lie in that which every oppressed individual feels within himself but hasn't the courage to express.

WILHELM REICH

Beyond Psychology: Letters and Journals, 1934-1939

Tags: Wilhelm Reich


I would then like to know how it comes about that when each piece of a story is true, the whole story turns out to be false?

ABRAHAM LINCOLN

debate with Stephen Douglas, September 18, 1858

Tags: Abraham Lincoln


The wayfarer,
Perceiving the pathway to truth,
Was struck with astonishment.
It was thickly grown with weeds.
"Ha," he said,
"I see that none has passed here
In a long time."
Later he saw that each weed
Was a singular knife.
"Well," he mumbled at last,
"Doubtless there are other roads."

STEPHEN CRANE

"The Wayfarer"

Tags: Stephen Crane


All things to all men only fools will tell,
Truth profits none but those that use it well.

JOHN STUART BLACKIE

The Wise Men of Greece: In a Series of Dramatic Dialogues

Tags: John Stuart Blackie


The man who lies to himself and listens to his own lie comes to a point that he cannot distinguish the truth within him, or around him, and so loses all respect for himself and for others.

FYODOR DOSTOEVSKY

The Brothers Karamazov

Tags: Fyodor Dostoevsky


There is no doubt that truth is to falsehood as light is to darkness; and so excellent a thing is truth that even when it touches humble and lowly matters, it still incomparably exceeds the uncertainty and falsehood in which great and elevated discourses are clothed; because even if falsehood be the fifth element of our minds, notwithstanding this, truth is the supreme nourishment of the higher intellects.

LEONARDO DA VINCI

Thoughts on Art and Life

Tags: Leonardo da Vinci


To convince someone of the truth, it is not enough to state it, but rather one must find the path from error to truth.

LUDWIG WITTGENSTEIN

Philosophical Occasions

Tags: Ludwig Wittgenstein


Truth is a moral requirement for society, and offenses against honesty, by word or action, are violations against character, ethics, and moral decency.

VINCENT J. BOVE

"Trojan Horse in the Heart of America", The Epoch Times, May 10, 2017


Truth never damages a cause that is just.

MAHATMA GANDHI

Non-Violence in Peace and War


If you can't tell the truth to the people you care about the most, eventually you stop being able to tell the truth to yourself.

CASSANDRA CLARE

City of Ashes

Tags: Cassandra Clare


Sometimes ... the truth isn't good enough. Sometimes people deserve more. Sometimes people deserve to have their faith rewarded.

CHRISTOPHER NOLAN

The Dark Knight


Not everything that's true needs to be said.

CASSANDRA CLARE

City of Bones

Tags: Cassandra Clare


For any truth, if overdone ... if exaggerated, or if carried beyond the limits of its applicability, can be reduced to absurdity.

VLADIMIR LENIN

Left-Wing Communism: An Infantile Disorder

Tags: Vladimir Lenin


There are two kinds of truths: those of reasoning and those of fact. The truths of reasoning are necessary and their opposite is impossible; the truths of fact are contingent and their opposites are possible.

GOTTFRIED WILHELM LEIBNIZ

La monadologie

Tags: Gottfried Wilhelm von Leibniz


To hell with the truth! As the history of the world proves, the truth has no bearing on anything. It's irrelevant and immaterial, as the lawyers say. The lie of a pipe dream is what gives life to the whole misbegotten mad lot of us, drunk or sober.

EUGENE O'NEILL

The Iceman Cometh

Tags: Eugene O'Neill


Truthiness is tearing apart our country, and I don't mean the argument over who came up with the word. I don't know whether it's a new thing, but it's certainly a current thing, in that it doesn't seem to matter what facts are. It used to be, everyone was entitled to their own opinion, but not their own facts. But that's not the case anymore. Facts matter not at all. Perception is everything. It's certainty.

STEPHEN COLBERT

interview, AV Club, January 25, 2006


Cynicism is an unpleasant way of saying the truth.

LILLIAN HELLMAN

The Little Foxes

Tags: Lillian Hellman


Fiction writers, at least in their braver moments, do desire the truth: to know it, speak it, serve it. But they go about it in a peculiar and devious way, which consists in inventing persons, places, and events which never did and never will exist or occur, and telling about these fictions in detail and at length and with a great deal of emotion, and then when they are done writing down this pack of lies, they say, There! That's the truth!

URSULA K. LE GUIN

introduction, The Left Hand of Darkness