Truth Quotes

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Good writers define reality; bad ones merely restate it. A good writer turns fact into truth; a bad writer will, more often than not, accomplish the opposite.

One of the peculiar sins of the twentieth century which we've developed to a very high level is the sin of credulity. It has been said that when human beings stop believing in God they believe in nothing. The truth is much worse: they believe in anything.

Malcolm Muggeridge

Truth sits upon the lips of dying men,
And falsehood, while I lived, was far from mine.

The truth is that many people set rules to keep from making decisions.

Mike Krzyzewski

Why waste time trying to discover the truth, when you can so easily create it?

I shall try to tell the truth, but the result will be fiction.

Katherine Anne Porter

She gave up beauty in her tender youth, gave all her hope and joy and pleasant ways; she covered up her eyes lest they should gaze on vanity, and chose the bitter truth.

Christina Rossetti

I can't help believing that these things that come from the subconscious mind have a sort of truth to them. It may not be a scientific truth, but it's psychological truth.

I love you and, because I love you, I would sooner have you hate me for telling you the truth than adore me for telling you lies.

For when it is the good that is under consideration, and the ethical object is predominant, truth must be considered more in reference to art than science, if, that is, unity is to be preserved in the work generally.

Friedrich Schleiermacher

The truth of the matter is that you always know the right thing to do. The hard part is doing it.

Norman Schwarzkopf, Jr.

The scientist is a lover of truth for the very love of truth itself, wherever it may lead.

There are many truths of which the full meaning cannot be realized until personal experience has brought it home.

John Stuart Mill

If now isn't a good time for the truth I don't see when we'll get to it.

But whether it be dream or truth, to do well is what matters. If it be truth, for truth's sake. If not, then to gain friends for the time when we awaken.

Pedro Calderón de la Barca

Kipps was unprepared for the unpleasant truth; that the path of social advancement is and must be strewn with broken friendships.

I believe that ignorance is the root of all evil. And that no one knows the truth.

Truth cannot be defined or tested by agreement with 'the world'; for not only do truths differ for different worlds but the nature of agreement between a world apart from it is notoriously nebulous.

A conservative government survives essentially by dampening expectations and subduing hopes. Conservatism is basically pessimistic, reformism is basically optimistic.
The Honourable Leader of the Opposition, Sir Billy Snedden, has broken his promise: the promise he made to me before the election. He promised not to tell any lies about me, if I didn't tell the truth about him.

Closest to the truth are those who deal lightly with it because they know it is inexhaustible.

Grow your tree of falsehood from a small grain of truth.
Do not follow those who lie in contempt of reality. Let your lie be even more logical than the truth itself,
So the weary travelers may find repose in the lie.

Czesław Miłosz

American traditions and the American ethic require us to be truthful, but the most important reason is that truth is the best propaganda and lies are the worst. To be persuasive we must be believable; to be believable we must be credible; to be credible we must be truthful. It is as simple as that.

Edward R. Murrow

You speak metaphorically, I hope, said Peggy.
I hope not, said Becca. Metaphors have a way of holding the most truth in the least space.

Orson Scott Card

Traditional scientific method has always been at the very best 20-20 hindsight. It's good for seeing where you've been. It's good for testing the truth of what you think you know, but it can't tell you where you ought to go.

Robert M. Pirsig

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

Nadine Gordimer