322 quotes about Truth

Too much truth is uncouth.

Adams, Franklin P.

The truth is often a terrible weapon of aggression. It is possible to lie, and even to murder, for the truth.

Adler, Alfred

If ever we hear a case of lying, we must look for a severe parents. A lie would have no sense unless the truth were felt as dangerous.

Alder, Alfred

That in the beginning when the world was young there were a great many thoughts but no such thing as truth. Man made the truths himself and each truth was a composite of a great many vague thoughts. All about in the world were truths and they were all beautiful.

Anderson, Sherwood

The trouble with lying and deceiving is that their efficiency depends entirely upon a clear notion of the truth that the liar and deceiver wishes to hide. In this sense, truth, even if it does not prevail in public, possesses an ineradicable primacy over all falsehoods.

Arendt, Hannah

The least initial deviation from the truth is multiplied later a thousandfold.

Aristotle

Plato is dear to me, but dearer still is truth.

Aristotle

A thing is not necessarily true because badly uttered, nor false because spoken magnificently.

Augustine, St.

One universe made up all that is; and one God in it all, and one principle of being, and one law, the reason shared by all thinking creatures, and one truth.

Aurelius, Marcus

We catch on to the truth and technique of expectation in those rare moments when we are stirred by an awareness of a guidance seemingly higher and greater than our own, when for a little while we are taken over by a force and an intelligence above and beyond those commonly felt. Confident and free, filled with wonder and ready acceptance, we permit ourselves to be taken over by our unquestioning self.

Bach, Dr. Marcus

Your only obligation in any lifetime is to be true to yourself. Being true to anyone else or anything else is not only impossible, but the mark of a fake messiah. [The Savior's Manual]

Bach, Richard

Not being known doesn't stop the truth from being true.

Bach, Richard

Error always addresses the passions and prejudices; truth scorns such mean intrigue, and only addresses the understanding and the conscience.

Backus, Azel

Truth arises more readily from error than from confusion.

Bacon, Francis

It is a pleasure to stand upon the shore, and to see ships tost upon the sea: a pleasure to stand in the window of a castle, and to see a battle and the adventures thereof below: but no pleasure is comparable to standing upon the vantage ground of truth... and to see the errors, and wanderings, and mists, and tempests, in the vale below.

Bacon, Francis

What is truth? said jesting Pilate; and would not stay for an answer.

Bacon, Francis

You never find yourself until you face the truth.

Bailey, Pearl

A platitude is simply a truth repeated till people get tired of hearing it.

Baldwin, James

We take our shape, it is true, within and against that cage of reality bequeathed us at our birth; and yet is precisely through our dependence on this reality that we are most endlessly betrayed.

Baldwin, James

It is unfortunate, considering that enthusiasm moves the world, that so few enthusiasts can be trusted to speak the truth.

Balfour, Arthur James

Falsehood is cowardice, the truth courage.

Ballou, Hosea

There's a little truth in all jive, and a little jive in all truth.

Barnes, Leonard

With the truth, you need to get rid of it as soon as possible and pass it on to someone else. As with illness, this is the only way to be cured of it. The person who keeps truth in his hands has lost.

Baudrillard, Jean

Nothing is poorer than a truth expressed as it was thought. Committed to writing in such cases, it is not even a bad photograph. Truth wants to be startled abruptly, at one stroke, from her self-immersion, whether by uproar, music or cries for help.

Benjamin, Walter

Between truth and the search for it, I choose the second.

Berenson, Bernard

There is an element of truth in every idea that lasts long enough to be called corny.

Berlin, Irving

I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.

Bible

Prove all things, hold fast to that which is true.

Bible

Seek and you will find.

Bible

The first wrote, wine is the strongest. The second wrote, the king is strongest. The third wrote, women are strongest: but above all things truth beareth away the victory. [Esdras 3:10]

Bible

The truth shall set you free.

Bible

Truth -- An ingenious compound of desirability and appearance.

Bierce, Ambrose

As scarce as truth is, the supply has always been in excess of the demand.

Billings, Josh

I will tell you the truth as soon as I figure it out.

Birmingham, Wayne

When you want to fool the world, tell the truth.

Bismarck, Otto Von

The truth told with bad intent Beats all the lies you can invent

Blake, William

When I tell any truth it is not for the sake of convincing those who do not know it, but for the sake of defending those who do.

Blake, William

For everything exists and not one sigh nor smile nor tear, one hair nor particle of dust, not one can pass away.

Blake, William

A truth that's told with bad intent beats all the lies you can invent.

Blake, William

Truth can never be told so as to be understood, and not be believed.

Blake, William

The great seal of truth is simplicity.

Boerhaave, Herman

The opposite of a correct statement is a false statement. But the opposite of a profound truth may well be another profound truth.

Bohr, Niels

There are trivial truths and the great truths. The opposite of a trivial truth is plainly false. The opposite of a great truth is also true.

Bohr, Niels

Truth alone wounds.

Bonaparte, Napoleon

Losing an illusion makes you wiser than finding a truth.

Borne, Ludwig

Eclecticism. Every truth is so true that any truth must be false.

Bradley, Francis H.

It's essential to tell the truth at all times. This will reduce life's pain. Lying distorts reality. All forms of distorted thinking must be corrected.

Bradshaw, John

The stream of time sweeps away errors, and leaves the truth for the inheritance of humanity.

Brandes, George

There is an abiding beauty which may be appreciated by those who will see things as they are and who will ask for no reward except to see.

Brittain, Vera

A man may be in as just possession of truth as of a city, and yet be forced to surrender.

Browne, Sir Thomas

Truth lies within ourselves: it takes no rise from outward things, whatever you may believe. There is an inmost center in us all, where truth abides in fullness and to Know rather consists in opening out a way whence the imprisoned splendor may escape than in effecting entry for light supposed to be without.

Browning, Robert

Truth never hurts the teller.

Browning, Robert

Truth gets well if she is run over by a locomotive, while error dies of lockjaw if she scratches her finger.

Bryant, William C.

One of the sublimest things in the world is plain truth.

Bulwer-Lytton, Edward G.

There is no such source of error as the pursuit of truth.

Butler, Samuel

For truth is precious and divine, too rich a pearl for carnal swine.

Butler, Samuel

Truth is always strange, stranger than fiction.

Byron, Lord

We call first truths those we discover after all the others.

Camus, Albert

A few observation and much reasoning lead to error; many observations and a little reasoning to truth.

Carrel, Alexis

What I tell you three times is true.

Carroll, Lewis

Truth may be stretched, but cannot be broken, and always gets above falsehood, as oil does above water.

Cervantes, Miguel De

Truth will rise above falsehood as oil above water.

Cervantes, Miguel De

You can only find truth with logic if you have already found truth without it.

Chesterton, Gilbert K.

Truth must necessarily be stranger than fiction, for fiction is the creation of the human mind and therefore congenial to it.

Chesterton, Gilbert K.

Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of them pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing happened.

Churchill, Winston

The truth is incontrovertible. Malice may attack it and ignorance may deride it, but in the end, there it is.

Churchill, Winston

In everything truth surpasses the imitation and copy.

Cicero, Marcus T.

See it like it is!

Cohen, Herb

It is your work to clear away the mass of encumbering material of thoughts, so that you may bring into plain view the precious thing at the center of the mass.

Collier, Robert

Theories are private property, but truth is common stock.

Colton, Charles Caleb

The greatest friend of truth is Time, her greatest enemy is Prejudice, and her constant companion is Humility.

Colton, Charles Caleb

It is man that makes truth great, not truth that makes man great.

Confucius

Everybody says it, and what everybody says must be true.

Cooper, James F.

Ceremony leads her bigots forth, prepared to fight for shadows of no worth. While truths, on which eternal things depend, can hardly find a single friend.

Cowper, William

Our job is only to hold up the mirror -- to tell and show the public what has happened.

Cronkite, Walter

The pursuit of truth will set you free; even if you never catch up with it.

Darrow, Clarence

Chase after the truth like all hell and you'll free yourself, even though you never touch its coat tails.

Darrow, Clarence

The love of truth lies at the root of much humor.

Davies, Robertson

You never see what you want to see, forever playing to the gallery.

Davies, Robertson

Part of my job is to train people to break down an involved question into a series of simple matters. Then we can all act intelligently

Deupree, Richard

I am always going to be true to myself.

Diana, Princess of Wales

There is nothing so strong or safe in an emergency of life as the simple truth.

Dickens, Charles

Truth is so rare that it is delightful to tell it.

Dickinson, Emily

Tell the truth, but tell it slant.

Dickinson, Emily

We swallow greedily any lie that flatters us, but we sip only little by little at a truth we find bitter.

Diderot, Denis

Never apologize for showing feeling. When you do so you apologize for truth.

Disraeli, Benjamin

Something unpleasant is coming when men are anxious to tell the truth.

Disraeli, Benjamin

Time is precious, but truth is more precious than time.

Disraeli, Benjamin

When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.

Doyle, Sir Arthur Conan

Truth disappears with the telling of it.

Durrell, Lawrence

Only the hand that erases can write the true thing.

Eckhart, Meister

All these constructions and the laws connecting them can be arrived at by the principle of looking for the mathematically simplest concepts and the link between them.

Einstein, Albert

Whoever undertakes to set himself up as judge in the field of truth and knowledge is shipwrecked by the laughter of the Gods.

Einstein, Albert

Anyone who doesn't take truth seriously in small matters cannot be trusted in large ones either.

Einstein, Albert

If you are out to describe the truth, leave elegance to the tailor.

Einstein, Albert

The pursuit of truth and beauty is a sphere of activity in which we are permitted to remain children all our lives.

Einstein, Albert

Things are more like they are now than they have ever been before.

Eisenhower, Dwight D.

The greater the truth the greater the libel.

Ellenborough, Lord

Truth is the property of no individual but is the treasure of all men.

Emerson, Ralph Waldo

Truth is the summit of being; justice is the application of it to affairs.

Emerson, Ralph Waldo

Truth is beautiful, without doubt; but so are lies.

Emerson, Ralph Waldo

The greatest homage we can pay truth is to use it.

Emerson, Ralph Waldo

Every mind has a choice between truth and repose. Take which you please you can never have both.

Emerson, Ralph Waldo

All necessary truth is its own evidence.

Emerson, Ralph Waldo

Whatever separates you from the Truth, throw it away, it will vanish anyhow.-

Emre, Yumus

A man that seeks truth and loves it must be reckoned precious to any human society.

Epictetus

The people have a right to the truth as they have a right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

Epictetus

The ultimate aim of the human mind, in all its efforts, is to become acquainted with Truth.

Farnham, Eliza

If I had my hand full of truth, I would take good care how I opened it.

Fontenelle, Bernard Le Bovier

The truth is always the strongest argument. Sophocles Truth is a thing immortal and perpetual, and it gives to us a beauty that fades not away in time.

Frederick The Great, (Frederick II)

From error to error, one discovers the entire truth.

Freud, Sigmund

The truth simply is that's all. It doesn't need reasons: it doesn't have to be right: it's just the truth. Period.

Frieseke, Frederick (Carl)

Why abandon a belief merely because it ceases to be true? Cling to it long enough and... it will turn true again, for so it goes. Most of the change we think we see in life is due to truths being in and out of favor.

Frost, Robert

Men in earnest have no time to waste in patching fig leaves for the naked truth.

Fuller, Max

Craft must have clothes, but truth loves to go naked.

Fuller, Thomas

Seeing is believing, but feeling's the truth.

Fuller, Thomas

Honest differences are often a healthy sign of progress.

Gandhi, Mahatma

Non-violence and truth are inseparable and presuppose one another.

Gandhi, Mahatma

The pursuit of truth does not permit violence on one's opponent.

Gandhi, Mahatma

There is no god higher than truth.

Gandhi, Mahatma

Whenever you have truth it must be given with love, or the message and the messenger will be rejected.

Gandhi, Mahatma

Funny how people despise platitudes, when they are usually the truest thing going. A thing has to be pretty true before it gets to be a platitude.

Gerould, Katherine F.

Say not, I have found the truth, but rather, I have found a truth.

Gibran, Kahlil

Believe those who are seeking truth, doubt those who find it.

Gide, Andre

It is easier to perceive error than to find truth, for the former lies on the surface and is easily seen, while the latter lies in the depth, where few are willing to search for it.

Goethe, Johann Wolfgang Von

I want everyone to tell me the truth, even if it costs him his job.

Goldwyn, Samuel

I don't want yes men around me. I want everyone to tell the truth, even if it costs them their jobs.

Goldwyn, Samuel

Truth isn't always beauty, but the hunger for it is.

Gordimer, Nadine

What is, is; and what ain't, ain't

Granville, Joseph E.

You ought to be true for the sake of the folks who think you are true. You never should stoop to a deed that your folks think you would not do. If you are false to yourself, be the blemish but small, you have injured your folks; you have been false to them all.

Guest, Edgar A.

Truth is not determined by majority vote.

Gwyn, Doug

True merit is like a river, the deeper it is, the less noise it makes.

Halifax, Edward F.

Effective thinking consists of being able to arrive at the truth; truth being defined as that which exists.

Hall, Calvin S.

Truth is like a torch; the more it is shook it shines.

Hamilton, Sir William

The greatest truths are the simplest, and so are the greatest men.

Hare, J. C.

The dissident does not operate in the realm of genuine power at all. He is not seeking power. He has no desire for office and does not gather votes. He does not attempt to charm the public, he offers nothing and promises nothing. He can offer, if anything, only his own skin -- and he offers it solely because he has no other way of affirming the truth he stands for. His actions simply articulate his dignity as a citizen, regardless of the cost.

Havel, Vaclav

I'm going to speak my mind because I have nothing to lose.

Hayakawa, S. I.

Truth is a torch that shines through the fog without dispelling it.

Helvetius, Claude A.

I know now that there is no one thing that is true -- it is all true.

Hemingway, Ernest

There's no one thing that is true. They're all true.

Hemingway, Ernest

Respect for the truth comes close to being the basis for all morality.

Herbert, Frank

We know how to speak many falsehoods that resemble real things, but we know, when we will, how to speak true things.

Hesiod

The truth is lived, not taught.

Hesse, Hermann

The truth has a million faces, but there is only one truth.

Hesse, Hermann

All great truths are simple in final analysis, and easily understood; if they are not, they are not great truths.

Hill, Napoleon

Your real boss is the one who walks around under your hat.

Hill, Napoleon

A new untruth is better than an old truth.

Holmes, Oliver Wendell

Rough work, iconoclasm, but the only way to get at truth.

Holmes, Oliver Wendell

Truth, when not sought after, rarely comes to light.

Holmes, Oliver Wendell

Truth is tough. It will not break, like a bubble, at the touch, nay, you may kick it about all day like a football, and it will be round and full at evening.

Holmes, Oliver Wendell

Truth is not a matter of personal viewpoint.

Howard, Vernon

Learn to see things as they really are, not as we imagine they are.

Howard, Vernon

Many people would be more truthful were it not for their uncontrollable desire to talk.

Howe, Edgar Watson

The wise boldly pick up a truth as soon as they hear it. Don't wait or a moment, or you'll lose your head.

Hsueh-Dou

Live truth instead of professing it.

Hubbard, Elbert

We should face reality and our past mistakes in an honest, adult way. Boasting of glory does not make glory, and singing in the dark does not dispel fear.

Hussein, King

Great is truth, but still greater, from a practical point of view, is silence about truth. By simply not mentioning certain subjects... totalitarian propagandists have influenced opinion much more effectively than they could have by the most eloquent denunciations.

Huxley, Aldous

Ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you mad.

Huxley, Aldous

It is the fate of new truths to begin as heresies and end and superstitions.

Huxley, Thomas H.

Irrationally held truths may be more harmful than reasoned errors.

Huxley, Thomas H.

We never fully grasp the import of any true statement until we have a clear notion of what the opposite untrue statement would be.

James, William

For here we are not afraid to follow truth wherever it may lead...

Jefferson, Thomas

It is error alone which needs the support of government. Truth can stand by itself.

Jefferson, Thomas

The man who fears no truth has nothing to fear from lies.

Jefferson, Thomas

In this world truth can wait; she is used to it.

Jerrold, Douglas William

What is true by lamplight is not always true by sunlight.

Joubert, Joseph

What the imagination seizes as beauty must be the truth.

Keats, John

The great enemy of the truth is very often not the lie -- deliberate, contrived, and dishonest -- but the myth -- persistent, persuasive, and unrealistic.

Kennedy, John F.

No matter what you believe, it doesn't change the facts.

Kersha, Al

A hair divides what is false and true.

Khayyam, Omar

The teller of a mirthful tale has latitude allowed him. We are content with less than absolute truth.

Lamb, Charles

Never lie when the truth is more profitable.

Lec, Stanislaw J.

All fixed set patterns are incapable of adaptability or pliability. The truth is outside of all fixed patterns.

Lee, Bruce

There's nothing you can know that isn't known.

Lennon, John

The fundamental laws are in the long run merely statements that every event is itself and not some different event.

Lewis, C. S.

Receiving a new truth is like adding a new sense.

Liebig

Let the people know the truth and the country is safe.

Lincoln, Abraham

I am not bound to win, but I am bound to be true. I am not bound to succeed but I am bound to live the best life that I have. I must stand with anybody that stands right and part from him when he goes wrong.

Lincoln, Abraham

Duration is not a test of truth or falsehood.

Lindbergh, Anne Morrow

One unerring mark of the love of truth is not entertaining any proposition with greater assurance than the proofs it is built upon will warrant.

Locke, John

The criterion of simplicity requires that the minimum number of assumptions be postulated.

Low, Albert

Those who know the truth are not equal to those who love it Confucius All truth is safe and nothing else is safe, but he who keeps back truth, or withholds it from men, from motives of expediency, is either a coward or a criminal.

Lowell, James Russell

Truth forever on the scaffold, wrong forever on the throne.

Lowell, James Russell

Truth, after all, wears a different face to everybody, and it would be too tedious to wait till all were agreed.

Lowell, James Russell

Superstition, idolatry and hypocrisy have ample wages, but the truth goes begging.

Luther, Martin

Peace if possible, but truth at any rate.

Luther, Martin

The true snob never rests: there is always a higher goal to attain, and there are, by the same token, always more and more people to look down upon.

Lynes, Russell

Wrong is wrong, no matter who does it or who says it.

Malcolm X

We do not condemn the preachers as an individual but we condemn what they teach. We urge that the preachers teach the truth, to teach our people the one important guiding rule of conduct -- unity of purpose.

Malcolm X

Always tell the truth -- it's the easiest thing to remember.

Mamet, David

If any man seeks for greatness, let him forget greatness and ask for truth, and he will find both.

Mann, Horace

Scientific truth is marvelous, but moral truth is divine and whoever breathes its air and walks by its light has found the lost paradise.

Mann, Horace

Truth uttered before its time is dangerous.

Mencius (Mengzi Meng-tse)

It is hard to believe that a man is telling the truth when you know that you would lie if you were in his place.

Mencken, H. L.

I believe that it is better to tell the truth than a lie. I believe it is better to be free than to be a slave. And I believe it is better to know than to be ignorant.

Mencken, H. L.

We spend all our time looking for some concept of Truth, but Truth is what is left when we drop all concepts.

Merzel, David

Truth is not beautiful, neither is ugly, Why should it be either? Truth is Truth.

Middleton, Owen C.

The idea that truth always triumphs over persecution is one of those pleasant falsehoods, which most experience refutes. History is teeming with instances of truth put down by persecution. If not put down forever, it may be set back for centuries.

Mill, John Stuart

I tell the truth, not as much as I would like to, but as much as I dare. I dare more and more as I grow older.

Montaigne, Michel Eyquem De

No problem can be solved until it is reduced to some simple form. The changing of a vague difficulty into a specific, concrete form is a very essential element in thinking.

Morgan, John Pierpont

Truth and virtue conquer.

Motto

Most truths are so naked that people feel sorry for them and cover them up, at least a little bit.

Murrow, Edward R.

The more abstract the truth you want to teach, the more thoroughly you must seduce the senses to accept it.

Nietzsche, Friedrich

Mystical explanations are considered deep. The truth is that they are not even superficial.

Nietzsche, Friedrich

Truth is something which can't be told in a few words. Those who simplify the universe only reduce the expansion of its meaning.

Nin, Anais

Truth is a thing immortal and perpetual, and it gives to us a beauty that fades not away in time.

Norris, Frank

there is no such thing as a harmless truth.

Nunn, Gregory

It is twice as hard to crush a half-truth as a whole lie.

O'Malley, Austin

Telling someone the truth is a loving act.

Pancoast, Mal

The truth will set you free, but first it will piss you off.

Pancoast, Mal

Those are weaklings who know the truth and uphold it as long as it suits their purpose, and then abandon it.

Pascal, Blaise

Truth often suffers more by the heat of its defenders than from the arguments of its opposers.

Penn, William

I pray without ceasing now. My personal prayer is: Make me an instrument which only truth can speak.

Pilgrim, Peace

Not every truth is the better for showing its face undisguised; and often silence is the wisest thing for a man to heed.

Pindar

The truth knocks on the door and you say, go away, I'm looking for the truth, and it goes away. Puzzling.

Pirsig, Robert M.

It is always good policy to tell the truth unless of course you are an exceptionally good liar. Jerome K. Jerome It is a puzzling thing. The truth knocks on the door and you say, go away, I'm looking for the truth. and so it goes away. Puzzling.

Pirsig, Robert M.

The solutions all are simple -- after you have arrived at them. But they're simple only when you know already what they are.

Pirsig, Robert M.

A new scientific truth does not triumph by convincing its opponents and making them see the light, but rather because its opponents eventually die, and a new generation grows up that is familiar with it.

Planck, Max

Truth is its own reward.

Plato

They deem him their worst enemy who tells them the truth.

Plato

A bare assertion is not necessarily the naked truth.

Prentice, George D.

Time tries truth.

Proverb

Tell the truth and then run.

Proverb

Truth is the daughter of time.

Proverb

Truth fears nothing but concealment.

Proverb

Better suffer for the truth than proper in a falsehood.

Proverb, Danish

A truth spoken before its time is dangerous.

Proverb, Greek

It is the truth that irritates a person.

Proverb, Spanish

If you speak the truth, have a foot in the stirrup.

Proverb, Turkish

A half truth is a whole lie.

Proverb, Yiddish

The truth only irritates those it enlightens, but does not convert.

Quesnel, Pasquier

Tell the truth and shame the devil.

Rabelais, Francois

You'll never get mixed up if you simply tell the truth. Then you don't have to remember what you have said, and you never forget what you have said.

Rayburn, Sam

Truth makes many appeals, not the least of which is its power to shock.

Renard, Jules

Truth is reality.

Richards, Mary Caroline

Truth can be a dangerous thing. It is quite patient and relentless.

Richards, R. Scott

True, what you sacrifice for the world is but poorly recognized by it; for it is man that rules and reaps the harvest; the thousand night watches and sacrifices by which a mother secures the state a hero or a poet are forgotten, not even mentioned, for the mother herself does not mention them, and so one century after another do the wives, unknown and unrewarded send forth the arrows, the starts the storm-birds and the nightingales of time.

Richter, Jean Paul

People say they love truth, but in reality they want to believe that which they love is true.

Ringer, Robert J.

If you ever injected truth into politics you would have no politics.

Rogers, Will

The truth is found when men are free to pursue it.

Roosevelt, Franklin D.

Are you going out after the truth, or are you going out after something you believe?

Rosen, Richard D.

Truth is always served by great minds, even if they fight it.

Rostand, Jean

Truth is stranger than fiction; fiction has to make sense.

Rosten, Leo

Falsehood has an infinity of combinations, but truth has only one mode of being.

Rousseau, Jean Jacques

Nature never deceives us; it is we who deceive ourselves.

Rousseau, Jean Jacques

There is no power on earth more formidable than the truth.

Runbeck, Margaret Lee

The fact that an opinion has been widely held is no evidence whatever that it is not utterly absurd.

Russell, Utterly

Nothing is true. Everything is permitted.

Sabbah

The basic truth of all things, as nearly as we may ever dream of determining and knowing this truth, is form, that which is, as it is. The way and shape of the thing no less than the thing itself.

Saroyan, William

Truth lives on in the midst of deception.

Schiller, Johann Friedrich Von

Every truth passes through three stages before it is recognized. In the first it is ridiculed, in the second it is opposed, in the third it is regarded as self evident.

Schopenhauer, Arthur

Truth has no special time of its own. Its hour is now -- always.

Schweitzer, Albert

The fact, if they are there, speak for themselves.

Seabury, David

What is true belongs to me!

Seneca

The most natural beauty in the world is honesty and moral truth. For all beauty is truth. True features make the beauty of the face; true proportions, the beauty of architecture; true measures, the beauty of harmony and music.

Shaftesbury, Lord

While you live tell the truth and shame the devil.

Shakespeare, William

Though I can make my extravaganzas appear credible, I cannot make the truth appear so.

Shaw, George Bernard

All great truths begin as blasphemies.

Shaw, George Bernard

Life's experiences are intended to make you eventually face yourself. Face reality!

Sherman, Harold

The knowledge of truth, combined with the proper regard for it and it's faithful observance, constitutes true education.

Smith, Joseph F.

When the dictators and the opportunists are gone, the cross will still stand before us and something in us will say, That is the real thing.

Sockman, Ralph W.

Everything you add to the truth subtracts from the truth.

Solzhenitsyn, Alexander

When truth is discovered by someone else, it loses something of its attractiveness.

Solzhenitsyn, Alexander

The truth is balance. However the opposite of truth, which is unbalance, may not be a lie.

Sontag, Susan

Truth is always the strongest argument.

Sophocles

People deserve... the truth. They deserve honesty. The best music, you can seek some shelter in it momentarily, but it's essentially there to provide you something to face the world with.

Springsteen, Bruce

Perhaps the truth depends on a walk around the lake.

Stevens, Wallace

The truth that is suppressed by friends is the readiest weapon of the enemy.

Stevenson, Robert Louis

Truth will always be truth, regardless of lack of understanding, disbelief or ignorance.

Stone, W. Clement

One should be just as careful about lying as about telling the truth.

Strachey, Lionel

What is true is true, and what is false is false...

Swedenborg, Emanuel

A truth looks freshest in the fashions of the day.

Tennyson, Lord Alfred

Of course, it is the same old story. Truth usually is the same old story.

Thatcher, Margaret

I have a theory that the truth is never told during the nine-to-five hours.

Thompson, Hunter S.

Between whom there is hearty truth, there is love.

Thoreau, Henry David

It takes two to speak truth -- one to speak, and another to hear.

Thoreau, Henry David

Rather than love, than money, than fame, give me truth.

Thoreau, Henry David

If truth is beauty, then how come no one has their hair done in a library?

Tomlin, Lily

Intense feeling too often obscures the truth.

Truman, Harry S.

I never gave anybody hell! I just told the truth and they thought it was hell.

Truman, Harry S.

We must have strong minds, ready to accept facts as they are.

Truman, Harry S.

Never tell the truth to people who are not worthy of it.

Twain, Mark

Truth is stranger than fiction, but it is because Fiction is obliged to stick to possibilities; Truth isn't.

Twain, Mark

If you tell the truth, you don't have to remember anything.

Twain, Mark

I never could tell a lie that anybody would doubt, nor a truth that anybody would believe.

Twain, Mark

Often the surest way to convey misinformation is to tell the strict truth.

Twain, Mark

Truth is neither alive nor dead; it just aggravates itself all the time.

Twain, Mark

No real gentleman will tell the naked truth in the presence of ladies.

Twain, Mark

The open-minded see the truth in different things: the narrow-minded see only the differences.

Unknown, Source

The TRUTH: It may not lead you to where you thought you were going, but it will always lead you somewhere better. When ignored, it will eventually show itself. The closeness of your relationships is directly proportional to the degree to which you have revealed the truth about yourself. It can be painful.

Unknown, Source

Truth is the greatest gift of life and love is the exercise of that truth.

Unknown, Source

Truth comes only to a prepared mind.

Unknown, Source

When in doubt, tell the truth.

Unknown, Source

Have a deep respect for the source of life and also for the ocean, for the forest, for the stars and for the truth.

Unknown, Source

Beware of the half truth. You may have gotten hold of the wrong half.

Unknown, Source

Just because you can laugh doesn't mean you can't tell the truth. Truth is often the jester.

Unknown, Source

Nothing ruins the truth like stretching it.

Unknown, Source

I have seen the truth and it makes no sense.

Unknown, Source

Being free of pretence does not mean you are in touch with the truth. Sincerity is not proof.

Unknown, Source

Long years must pass before the truths we have made for ourselves become our very flesh.

Valery, Paul

To announce truths is an infallible receipt for being persecuted.

Voltaire

Truth is a fruit which should not be plucked until it is ripe.

Voltaire

To be persuasive, we must be believable. To be believable, we must be credible. To be credible, we must be truthful.

Walters, Hellmut

Things are as they are. Looking out into it the universe at night, we make no comparisons between right and wrong stars, nor between well and badly arranged constellations.

Watts, Alan W.

In this world, only those people who have fallen to the lowest degree of humiliation, far below beggary, who are not just without any social consideration but are regarded by all as being deprived of that foremost human dignity, reason itself -- only those people, in fact, are capable of telling the truth. All the others lie.

Weil, Simone

I have done more harm by the falseness of trying to please than by the honesty of trying to hurt.

West, Jessamyn

As one may bring himself to believe almost anything he is inclined to believe, it makes all the difference whether we begin or end with the inquiry, What is truth?

Whately, Richard

Everyone wishes to have truth on his side, but not everyone wishes to be on the side of truth.

Whately, Richard

What is morality in any given time or place? It is what the majority then and there happen to like, and immorality is what they dislike.

Whitehead, Alfred North

Whatever satisfies the soul is truth.

Whitman, Walt

A thing is not necessarily true because a man dies for it.

Wilde, Oscar

If one tells the truth, one is sure, sooner or later, to be found out.

Wilde, Oscar

The pure and simple truth is rarely pure and never simple.

Wilde, Oscar

If you are going to tell people the truth, be funny or they will kill you.

Wilder, Billy

One often makes a remark and only later sees how true it is.

Wittgenstein, Ludwig

Mental fight means thinking against the current, not with it. It is our business to puncture gas bags and discover the seeds of truth.

Woolf, Virginia

The truth is more important than the facts.

Wright, Frank Lloyd

If we all worked on the assumption that what is accepted as true is really true, there would be little hope of advance.

Wright, Orville

Truth is exact correspondence with reality.

Yogananda, Paramahansa

The truth is on the march and nothing will stop it.

Zola, Emile

If you shut up truth and bury it under the ground, it will but grow, and gather to itself such explosive power that the day it bursts through it will blow up everything in its way.

Zola, Emile

Truth does not contradict truth.

Zweifel, Elizer Zvi