quotations about truth
I shall try to tell the truth, but the result will be fiction.
KATHERINE ANNE PORTER
Collected Stories and Other Writings
I didn't care about truth; I cared about beauty. It took me many years--it took the experience of lived time--to realize that they really are the same thing.
ELIF BATUMAN
The Possessed
Some sorts of truth are truer than others.
JACK LONDON
John Barleycorn
Truth is literally that which is without secrecy, what discloses itself without a veil.
R. D. LAING
attributed, R. D. Laing: The Philosophy and Politics of Psychotherapy
The truth can both lift up and knock down.
KIRBY LARSON
Hattie Ever After
Truth is my God. Non-violence is the means of realizing Him.
MAHATMA GANDHI
Young India, January 8, 1925
Truth is a pillar erected by God, and upholdeth the universe.
JAMES LINEN
"Desultorious Chronicles", The Poetical and Prose Writings of James Linen
Truth is too precious a commodity to be wasted upon mere idolators.
HERNANDEZ CORTEZ
attributed, Day's Collacon
I sometimes have these spells of compulsive truth. But as Lady Macbeth would say, "The fit is momentary."
KEN KESEY
Sometimes a Great Notion
The truth does not change according to our ability to stomach it.
FLANNERY O'CONNOR
letter, September 6, 1955
It is error alone which needs the support of government. Truth can stand by itself.
THOMAS JEFFERSON
Notes on Virginia
I tried to put a bird in a cage.
O fool that I am!
For the bird was Truth.
Sing merrily, Truth: I tried to put
Truth in a cage!
WILLIAM CARLOS WILLIAMS
The Fool's Song
I do not think that so much harm is done by giving error to a child, as by giving truth in a lifeless form.
WILLIAM E. CHANNING
Thoughts
Man is not permitted without censure to follow his own thoughts in the search of truth, when they lead him ever so little out of the common road.
JOHN LOCKE
An Essay Concerning Human Understanding
If you handle truth carelessly, it will cut your fingers.
AUSTIN O'MALLEY
Keystones of Thought
Condemn not truth for error's deeds.
MARTHA LAVINIA HOFFMAN
"Flowers and Weeds"
I tore myself away from the safe comfort of certainties through my love for truth -- and truth rewarded me.
SIMONE DE BEAUVOIR
All Said and Done
The cold passion for truth hunts in no pack.
ROBINSON JEFFERS
"Be Angry at the Sun"
The only time I see the truth is when I cross my eyes.
LOUISE ERDRICH
The Last Report on the Miracles at Little No Horse
Great is truth, but still greater, from a practical point of view, is silence about truth.
ALDOUS HUXLEY
Brave New World