quotations about truth
If you want to tell people the truth, make them laugh, otherwise they'll kill you.
OSCAR WILDE
The Nightingale and the Rose
Truths that startled the generation in which they were first announced become in the next age the commonplaces of conversation; as the famous airs of operas which thrilled the first audiences come to be played on hand-organs in the streets.
HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW
Table-Talk
Truth never changes.
REUEN THOMAS
Thoughts for the Thoughtful
Truth is a point of view about things.
MARCEL PROUST
attributed, Empire Star
Things we wish to be true are apt to gain too ready credit with us.
SAMUEL RICHARDSON
Pamela
The truth may often be carried about by those who themselves remain all unaware of it. They bear that which has weight and substance and yet for them has no name whereby it may be evoked or called forth. They go about ignorant of the true nature of their condition, such are the wiles of truth and such its stratagems.
CORMAC MCCARTHY
The Crossing
If truth is the lure, humans are fishes.
JANE HIRSHFIELD
"If Truth Is the Lure, Humans Are Fishes"
I am sure, zeal or love for truth can never permit falsehood to be used in the defence of it.
JOHN LOCKE
The Reasonableness of Christianity
Believe those who are seeking the truth. Doubt those who find it.
ANDRE GIDE
So Be It; or, The Chips Are Down
And the truth is cold, as a giant's knee
Will seem cold.
JOHN ASHBERY
"A Last World"
A man avails himself of the truth so long as it is serviceable; but he seizes on what is false with a passionate eloquence as soon as he can make a momentary use of it.
JOHANN WOLFGANG VON GOETHE
The Maxims and Reflections of Goethe
Truths are first clouds, then rain, then harvests and food.
HENRY WARD BEECHER
Life Thoughts
Truth, though hewn like the mangled form of Osiris into a thousand pieces, and scattered to the four winds, shall be gathered limb to limb, and moulded with every joint and member into an immortal feature of loveliness and perfection.
ELIZA COOK
Diamond Dust
Truth as philosophy is a gas; as art, it is visible steam.
AUSTIN O'MALLEY
Keystones of Thought
There are tides of justice surging to the unknown shores of right;
Stars of truth that seek a setting in the dark, untutored night.
EDWIN LEIBFREED
"Caelestis"
Error is related to truth as sleep to waking. I have observed that on awakening from error a man turns again to truth as with new vigour.
JOHANN WOLFGANG VON GOETHE
The Maxims and Reflections of Goethe
Discussion is impossible with someone who claims not to seek the truth, but already to possess it.
ROMAIN ROLLAND
Above the Battle
Where the interests of truth are at actual stake, we ought, perhaps, to sacrifice even that which is our own--if, at least, we are to lay any claim to a philosophic spirit.
ARISTOTLE
Nicomachean Ethics
Truth doesn't always heal a wounded soul.
MAXIM GORKY
The Lower Depths
There is truth and then again there is truth. For all that the world is full of people who go around believing they've got you or your neighbor figured out, there really is no bottom to what is not known. The truth about us is endless. As are the lies.
PHILIP ROTH
The Human Stain