TRUTH QUOTES XIX

quotations about truth

Serious misfortunes, originating in misrepresentation, frequently flow and spread before they can be dissipated by truth.

GEORGE WASHINGTON

letter to John Jay, May 8, 1796

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We cannot make things true by any amount of effort; we can merely discover what God has made true from all eternity.

HENRY WHITNEY BELLOWS

Re-statements of Christian Doctrine

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Truth is that which is. It seems to me that the important thing is for the mind to be in a state when it can allow itself not to ask, not to demand, which does not mean acquiescence, acceptance, but that the mind is really silent.

JIDDU KRISHNAMURTI

"What was true yesterday is not true today", The New Indian Express, March 2, 2017

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Every dogma embodies some shade of truth to give it seeming currency.

AMOS BRONSON ALCOTT

Table Talk

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Fairer than all fancies is the truth.

CAROLINE SPENCER

"A Vigil"

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Understand that the tongue can conceal the truth, but the eyes--never!

MIKHAIL BULGAKOV

The Master and Margarita

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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

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It takes great courage to back truth unacceptable to our times. There's a punishment for it, and it's usually crucifixion.

JOHN STEINBECK

East of Eden

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When we walk towards the sun of Truth, all shadows are cast behind us.

HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW

Table-Talk

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Whoever undertakes to set himself up as a judge of Truth and Knowledge is shipwrecked by the laughter of the gods.

ALBERT EINSTEIN

Ideas and Opinions: Based on Mein Weltbild

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Truth -- there's no such thing.

TANKRED DORST

Freedom for Clemens

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Though all the winds of doctrine were let loose to play upon the earth, so Truth be in the field, we do injuriously by licensing and prohibiting to misdoubt her strength. Let her and Falsehood grapple; who ever knew Truth put to the worse, in a free and open encounter.

JOHN MILTON

Areopagitica

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If the feeble mind of man did not presume to resist the clear evidence of truth, but yielded its infirmity to wholesome doctrines, as to a health-giving medicine, until it obtained from God, by its faith and piety, the grace needed to heal it, they who have just ideas, and express them in suitable language, would need to use no long discourse to refute the errors of empty conjecture. But this mental infirmity is now more prevalent and hurtful than ever, to such an extent that even after the truth has been as fully demonstrated as man can prove it to man, they hold for the very truth their own unreasonable fancies, either on account of their great blindness, which prevents them from seeing what is plainly set before them, or on account of their opinionative obstinacy, which prevents them from acknowledging the force of what they do see.

ST. AUGUSTINE

The City of God

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Arguably, this strategy is not viable beyond laboratory settings, because the truth is always unknown on the streets.

ANNA K. BOBAK

"Can We Improve National Security Using What We Know about Face Recognition?", Scientific American, April 18, 2017


I've always been suspicious of collective truths. I think an idea is true when it hasn't been put into words and that the moment it's put into words it becomes exaggerated. Because the moment it's put into words there's an abuse, an excess in the expression of the idea that makes it false.

EUGENE IONESCO

Conversations with Eugene Ionesco

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There is no worse lie than a truth misunderstood by those who hear it.

WILLIAM JAMES

Lectures XIV and XV, "The Value of Saintliness", The Varieties of Religious Experience

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Platitudes are safe, because they're easy to wink at, but truth is something else again.

HUNTER S. THOMPSON

The Proud Highway


Just think, reader, what will happen to you if the truth of a mad beast overpowers the sane truth of man?

MAXIM GORKY

Untimely Thoughts

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The sublime delight of truthful speech to one who has the great gift of uttering it, will make itself felt even through the pangs of sorrow.

GEORGE ELIOT

Felix Holt


You're never going to see the truth. [It's] what you're shooting for always and you always miss it. Every once in a while, you catch an edge of it. That's what's you hope for, I think, as an artist.

SAM SHEPARD

interview, 2005

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