Quotes About Certainty

There was truth and there was untruth, and if you clung to the truth even against the whole world, you were not mad.

But the thought of being a lunatic did not greatly trouble him; the horror was that he might also be wrong.

Perhaps a lunatic was simply a minority of one. At one time it had been a sign of madness to believe that the Earth goes round the Sun; today, to believe the past is inalterable. He might be alone in holding that belief, and if alone, then a lunatic. But the thought of being a lunatic did not greatly trouble him; the horror was that he might also be wrong.

I believe that on such an issue as this no one is or can be completely truthful. It is difficult to be certain about anything except what you have seen with your own eyes, and consciously or unconsciously everyone writes as a partisan

The one certain thing was that death never came at an expected moment.

It was more natural to exist from moment to moment, accepting another ten minutes' life even with the certainty that there was torture at the end of it.

But at any rate, one thing was certain. The conspiracy that he had dreamed of did exist, and he had reached the outer edges of it.

How can I help seeing what is in front of my eyes? Two and two are four." "Sometimes, Winston. Sometimes they are five. Sometimes they are three. Sometimes they are all of them at once. You must try harder. It is not easy to become sane.

For how could you establish even the most obvious fact when there existed no record outside your own memory?

Había la verdad y lo que no era verdad y si una se aferraba a la verdad incluso contra el mundo entero, no estaba uno loco.

Not a word of it could ever be proved or disproved.

One way of feeling infallible is not to keep a diary

Nationalism is power-hunger tempered by self-deception. Every nationalist is capable of the most flagrant dishonesty, but he is also — since he is conscious of serving something bigger than himself — unshakeably certain of being in the right.

World-conquest is believed in most firmly by those who know it to be impossible.

For, after all, how do we know that two and two make four? Or that the force of gravity works? Or that the past is unchangeable? If both the past and the external world exist only in the mind, and if the mind itself is controllable what then?

It is difficult to be certain about anything except what you have seen with your own eyes, and consciously or unconsciously everyone writes as a partisan.

La liberté, c'est la liberté de dire que deux et deux font quatre. Une fois que cela est accordé, le reste suit automatiquement.

There was truth and untruth, and if you clung to the truth even against the whole world, you were not mad.

Sei lento nell'apprendere, Winston» [...] «Ma come posso fare a meno...» piagnucolò «come posso fare a meno di vedere quello che ho davanti agli occhi? Due più due fa quattro». «A volte, Winston. A volte fa cinque, a volte tre. A volte fa cinque, quattro e tre contemporaneamente. Devi sforzarti di più. Non è facile diventare sani di mente».

Truisms are true, hold on to that! The solid world exists, its laws to not change. Stones are hard, water is wet, objects unsupported fall towards the earth's center. With the feeling that he was speaking to O'brien, and also that he was setting forth an important axiom, he wrote: 'Freedom is the freedom to say that two plus two make four. If that is granted, all else follows.

La libertad consiste en decir que dos y dos son cuatro.

It has never happened!" cannot be construed to mean, "It can never happen!"—as well say, "Because I have never broken my leg, my leg is unbreakable," or "Because I've never died, I am immortal.

Difficult to believe, yet absolutely true.

Credo quia absurdum