Quotes from Arthur Conan Doyle

You mentioned your name as if I should recognize it, but beyond the obvious facts that you are a bachelor, a solicitor, a freemason, and an asthmatic, I know nothing whatever about you.

To the man who loves art for its own sake, it is frequently in its least important and lowliest manifestations that the keenest pleasure is to be derived.

Well, he said, I say, now, as I said then, that a man should keep his little brain-attic stocked with all the furniture that he is likely to use, and the rest he can put away in the lumber-room of this library, where he can get it if he wants it.

The ways of fate are indeed hard to understand. If there is not some compensation hereafter, then the world is a cruel jest.

A wondrous subtle thing is love, for here were we two, who had never seen each other before that day, between whom no word or even look of affection had ever passed, and yet now in an hour of trouble our hands instinctively sought for each other… So we stood hand in hand like two children, and there was peace in our hearts for all the dark things that surrounded us.

Some believe what separates men from animals is our ability to reason. Others say it's language or romantic love, or opposable thumbs. Living here in this lost world, I've come to believe it is more than our biology. What truly makes us human is our unending search, our abiding desire for immortality.

I think that I had better go, Holmes. Not a bit, doctor. Stay where you are. I am lost without my Boswell.

But this rose is an extra. Its smell and its color are an embellishment of life, not a condition of it. It is only goodness which gives extras, and so I say again that we have much to hope from the flowers.

To Sherlock Holmes she is always the woman. I have seldom heard him mention her under any other name. In his eyes she eclipses and predominates the whole of her sex.

I have wrought my simple plan If I give one hour of joy To the boy who's half a man, Or the man who's half a boy.

It is a capital mistake to theorise before one has data. Insensibly one begins to twist facts to suit theories, instead of theories to suit facts.

In his eyes she eclipses and predominates the whole of her sex.

So swift, silent and furtive were his movements like those of a trained bloodhound picking out a scent, that I could not but think what a terrible criminal he would have made had he turned his energy and sagacity against the law instead of exerting them in its defense.

You say that your fare told you that he was a detective? Yes, he did. When did he say this? When he left me. Did he say anything more? He mentioned his name. Holmes cast a swift glance of triumph at me. Oh, he mentioned his name, did he? That was imprudent. What was the name that he mentioned? "His name, said the cabman, was Mr. Sherlock Holmes.

You have brought detection as near an exact science as it ever will be brought in this world." My companion flushed up with pleasure at my words, and the earnest way in which I uttered them. I had already observed that he was as sensitive to flattery on the score of his art as any girl could be of her beauty.

Oh how I've missed you, Holmes.

You cannot see the lettuce and the dressing without suspecting a salad.

It's every man's business to see justice done.

Draw your chair up, and hand me my violin, for the only problem which we have still to solve is how to while away these bleak autumnal evenings.

The more outré and grotesque an incident is the more carefully it deserves to be examined.

Let me see—what are my other shortcomings? I get in the dumps at times, and don't open my mouth for days on end. You must not think I am sulky when I do that. Just let me alone, and I'll soon be right. What have you to confess now? It's just as well for two fellows to know the worst of one another before they begin to live together.

It is of the first importance not to allow your judgment to be biased by personal qualities. A client is to me a mere unit, ---a factor in a problem. - Sherlock Holmes

I have no data yet. It is a capital mistake to theorise before one has data. Insensibly one begins to twist facts to suit theories, instead of theories to suit facts.

Problems may be solved in the study which have baffled all those who have sought a solution by the aid of their senses. To carry the art, however, to its highest pitch, it is necessary that the reasoner should be able to use all the facts which have come to his knowledge; and this in itself implies, as you will readily see, a possession of all knowledge, which, even in these days of free education and encyclopaedias, is a somewhat rare accomplishment.