quotations about truth
Truth is both arms and armour.
EDWARD COUNSEL
Maxims
A thousand probabilities do not make one truth.
ITALIAN PROVERB
Sweet Truth is a queen proud and mighty--
Her throne is in heaven above.
ARDELIA COTTON BARTON
Thoughts
I never saw any good that came of telling truth.
JOHN DRYDEN
Amphitryon
On the face of it, it must be a bad cause which will not bear discussion. Truth seeks light instead of shunning it.
HORACE MANN
Thoughts
In all debates, let Truth be thy aim, not Victory.
WILLIAM PENN
Some Fruits of Solitude
Truth is poetry; it is the grandest poetry.
E. H. CHAPIN
Living Words
The most difficult thing is to renounce the truth and the possibility of verification, to remain as long as possible on the enigmatic, ambivalent, and reversible side of thought.
JEAN BAUDRILLARD
The Vital Illusion
God sends ten thousand truths, which come about us like birds seeking inlet; but we are shut up to them, and so they bring us nothing, but sit and sing a while upon the roof and then fly away.
HENRY WARD BEECHER
Life Thoughts
The truth knocks on the door and you say, "Go away, I'm looking for the truth," and so it goes away.
ROBERT M. PIRSIG
Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance
The practice of utter sincerity towards other men would avail to no good end, if they were incapable of practising it towards their own minds. In fact, truth cannot be communicated until it is perceived.
PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY
"Essay on Christianity"
All you can do, every day, is to learn the truth as best you can.
SUSANNE ALLEYN
Game of Patience
When we mean to touch the heart, we always speak the truth in some degree. It is our last resource; and if it were our first, we should have less to lament.
ELIZA COOK
Diamond Dust
We have great power to see the truth when the truth is all we wish to see; but what is easier than to credit what we desire? and can a man deceive anyone so easily as himself?
JAMES VILA BLAKE
Essays
That which is not formed of truth is of bad texture.
EDWARD COUNSEL
Maxims
Truth may perhaps come to the price of a pearl, that showeth best by day; but it will not rise to the price of a diamond or carbuncle, that showeth best in varied lights. A mixture of a lie doth ever add pleasure. Doth any man doubt that, if there were taken out of men's minds vain opinions, flattering hopes, false valuations, imaginations as one would, and the like, but it would leave the minds of a number of men poor shrunken things, full of melancholy and indisposition, and unpleasing to themselves?
FRANCIS BACON
Essays
Truth is the cry of all, but the game of few.
AMOS BRONSON ALCOTT
Table Talk
The sad truth is the truth is sad.
DANIEL HANDLER
as Lemony Snicket, The Hostile Hospital
Telling the truth is a beautiful act even if the truth itself is ugly.
GLEN DUNCAN
The Last Werewolf
No one wants it to be true. But the truth doesn't care what anyone wants.
GLEN DUNCAN
By Blood We Live