Quotes from Khushwant Singh

I acquired long-lived parents. My mother died at 94. Father died at 90, holding a glass of whisky. I think that's the secret of longevity - to have long-lived parents. The rest is discipline.

Your principle should be to see everything and say nothing. The world changes so rapidly that if you want to get on you cannot afford to align yourself with any person or point of view.

Not forever does the bulbul sing In balmy shades of bowers, Not forever lasts the spring Nor ever blossom the flowers. Not forever reigneth joy, Sets the sun on days of bliss, Friendships not forever last, They know not life, who know not this.

When the world is itself draped in the mantle of night, the mirror of the mind is like the sky in which thoughts twinkle like stars.

Freedom is for the educated people who fought for it. We were slaves of the English, now we will be slaves of the educated Indians—or the Pakistanis.

The last to learn of gossip are the parties concerned

India is constipated with a lot of humbug. Take religion. For the Hindu, it means little besides caste and cow-protection. For the Muslim, circumcision and kosher meat. For the Sikh, long hair and hatred of the Muslim. For the Christian, Hinduism with a sola topee. For the Parsi, fire-worship and feeding vultures. Ethics, which should be the kernel of a religious code, has been carefully removed.

Morality is a matter of money. Poor people cannot afford to have morals. So they have religion

That's Delhi. When life gets too much for you all you need to do is to spend an hour at Nigambodh Ghat,watch the dead being put to flames and hear their kin wail for them. Then come home and down a couple of pegs of whisky. In Delhi, death and drink make life worth living

Once through this ruined city did I pass I espied a lonely bird on a bough and asked 'What knowest thou of this wilderness?' It replied: 'I can sum it up in two words: 'Alas, Alas!

Poor people cannot afford to have morals. So they have religion.

We are of the mysterious East. No proof, just faith. No reason, just faith.

The doer must do only when the receiver is ready to receive. Otherwise, the act is wasted.

Consciousness of the bad is an essential prerequisite to the promotion of the good.

I asked my soul: What is Delhi? She replied: The world is the body and Delhi its life. Mirza Asadullah Khan Ghalib

But big people's illnesses are always made to sound big. The simple shutting and opening of the royal arse-hole was made to sound as if the world was coming to an end.

If the blanket of man's fate has been woven black, even the waters of Zam Zam and Kausar cannot wash it white.

If you look at things as they are, there does not seem to be a code either of man or of God on which one can pattern one's conduct. Wrong triumphs over right as much as right over wrong. Sometimes its triumphs are greater. What happens ultimately, you do not know. In such circumstances what can you do but cultivate an utter indifference to all values? Nothing matters. Nothing whatever...

So many gods, so many creeds, so many paths that wind and wind When just the art of being kind is all that the sad world needs.

In a country which had accepted caste distinctions for many centuries, inequality had become an inborn mental concept.

Oh the gladness of her gladness when she's glad, And the sadness of her sadness when she's sad; But the gladness of her gladness, And the sadness of her sadness, Are as nothing, Charles, To the badness of her badness when she is bad.

We also knew that it was in the nature of an empty stomach to produce illusions of grandeur.

Under the circumstances the only honest answer an intelligent person can give to the question 'Is there a God?' is to say, 'I do not know.

One Sikh may argue with one Sikh. One Sikh must never argue with two Sikhs–certainly not after dark.