Quotes About Truth

Esse quam videri - To be, rather than to seem (to be)

Justice looks for no prize and no price; it is sought for itself, and is at once the cause and meaning of all the virtues. . . . The worst kind of injustice is to look for profit from injustice.

Honesty is the best policy

But if I am wrong in thinking the human soul immortal, I am glad to be wrong; nor will I allow the mistake which gives me so much pleasure to be wrested from me as long as I live.

It is not merriment and wantonness, nor laughter or jesting, the comrade of frivolity, that make men happy; those are happy, often in sadness, whose wills are strong and true.

We are born for justice, and . . . what is just is based, not on opinion, but on nature.

Das also ist keine Freundschaft, dass, wenn der eine die Wahrheit nicht hören will, der andere zum Lügen bereit ist.

Utinam tam facile vera invenire possim quam falsa convincere.

Marcus Tullius Cicero

Age nunc, refer animum, sis, ad veritatem, [...].

Justice is the mistress and queen of all the virtues.

Never let a fool kiss you or a kiss fool you.

Don't let a fool kiss you, or a kiss fool you.

A truth should exist, it should not be used like this. If I love you is that a fact or a weapon?

But people will do anything rather than admit that their lives have no meaning. No use, that is. No plot.

Touch comes before sight, before speech. It is the first language and the last, and it always tells the truth.

There's an epigram tacked to my office bulletin board, pinched from a magazine -- Wanting to meet an author because you like his work is like wanting to meet a duck because you like pâté.

Knowing was a temptation. What you don't know won't tempt you.

The desire to be loved is the last illusion Give it up and you will be free.

The true story is vicious and multiple and untrue after all. Why do you need it? Don't ever ask for the true story.

There's the story, then there's the real story, then there's the story of how the story came to be told. Then there's what you leave out of the story. Which is part of the story too.

Once a story you've regarded as true has turned false, you begin suspecting all stories.

The truth can cause a lot of trouble for those who are not supposed to know it.

The newspaper stories were like dreams to us, bad dreams dreamt by others. How awful, we would say, and they were, but they were awful without being believable. They were too melodramatic, they had a dimension that was not the dimension of our lives. We were the people who were not in the papers. We lived in the blank white spaces at the edges of print. It gave us more freedom. We lived in the gaps between the stories.