Quotes About Honesty

There's more beauty in the truth even if it is dreadful beauty.

Horace Quinn remembered questioning Adam so very long ago, remembered him as a man in agony. He could still see Adam's haunted and horrified eyes. He had thought then of Adam as a man of such honesty that he couldn't conceive anything else. Adam had been set apart—an invisible wall cut him off from the world. You couldn't get into him—he couldn't get out to you. But in that old agony there had been no wall.

If something was untrue and you didn't know it, that was error. But if you knew a true thing and changed it to a false thing, both you and it were loathsome.

I know that sometimes a lie is used in kindness. I don't believe it ever works kindly. The quick pain of truth can pass away, but the slow, eating agony of a lie is never lost. That's a running sore.

There's more beauty in the truth even if it is a dreadful beauty.

At the very first he knew he was lying, but it was not long before he was equally sure that every one of his stories was true.

She controlled her face and whipped the fear from it. "You're just doing it because you're honest, is that it? You're just too sugar sweet to live.

Unii vor spune ca povestea asta este o minciuna, ceea ce nu inseamna ca ceva care nu s-a petrecut este numaidecat o minciuna.

having nothing that can be stolen, exploited

The honest preachers had energy and go. They fought the devil, no holds barred, boots and eye-gouging permitted. You might get the idea that they howled truth and beauty the way a seal bites out the National Anthem on a row of circus horns.

It takes great courage to back truth unacceptable to our times.

It's the lie I'm thinking of. It might infect everything. If they ever found out you'd lied to them about this, the true things would suffer. They wouldn't believe anything then." "Yes, I see. But what can I tell them? I couldn't tell them the whole truth." "Maybe you can tell them a part truth, enough so that you won't suffer if they find out.

I will know from your talk whether I can offer an honest opinion or whether it is better to reassure you in your own.

If I could do this book properly it would be one of the really fine books and a truly American book. But I am assailed with my own ignorance and inability. I'll just have to work from a background of these. Honesty. If I can keep an honesty it is all I can expect of my poor brain. . . . If I can do that it will be all my lack of genius can produce. For no one else knows my lack of ability the way I do. I am pushing against it all the time.

No, to a monster the norm must seem monstrous, since everyone is normal to himself. To the inner monster it must be even more obscure, since he has no visible thing to compare with others. To a man born without conscience, a soul-stricken man must seem ridiculous. To a criminal, honesty is foolish. You must not forget that a monster is only a variation, and that to a monster the norm is monstrous.

A man who writes a story is forced to put into it the best of his knowledge and the best of his feeling. The discipline of the written word punishes stupidity and dishonesty. A writer lives in awe of words for they can be cruel or kind, and they can change their meanings right in front of you.

Look here," said Will. "When a man comes to me for advice about an idea, I know he doesn't want advice. He wants me to agree with him. And if I want to keep his friendship I tell him his idea is fine and go ahead. But I like you and you're a friend of my family, so I'm going to stick my neck out.

my father became very Chinese then. He said, 'There's more beauty in the truth even if it is dreadful beauty. The storytellers at the city gate twist life so that it looks sweet to the lazy and the stupid and the weak, and this only strengthens their infirmities and teaches nothing, cures nothing, nor does it let the heart soar

I can tell all I want about them now because they are all dead and they won't resent the truth about themselves.

Cal's mind careened in anger at himself and in pity for himself. And then a new voice came into it, saying coolly and with contempt, "If you're being honest—why not say you are enjoying this beating you're giving yourself? That would be the truth. Why not be just what you are and do just what you do?" Cal sat in shock from this thought. Enjoying?—of course. By whipping himself he protected himself against whipping by someone else.

It has always seemed strange to me," said Doc. "The things we admire in men, kindness and generosity, openness, honesty, understanding and feeling are the concomitants of failure in our system. And those traits we detest, sharpness, greed, acquisitiveness, meanness, egotism and self-interest are the traits of success.

There's more beauty in truth, even if it is dreadful beauty.

She told the best lie of all—the truth.

Lee's voice said, "I know that sometimes a lie is used in kindness. I don't believe it ever works kindly. The quick pain of truth can pass away, but the slow, eating agony of a lie is never lost. That's a running sore.