Quotes About Truth

William Blake that, it occurred to me later, neatly aligned the way of the scientist with that of the mystic: "The true method of knowledge is experiment.

But along with the feeling of ineffability, the conviction that some profound objective truth has been disclosed to you is a hallmark of the mystical experience, regardless of whether it has been occasioned by a drug, meditation, fasting, flagellation, or sensory deprivation.

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changing the course of history or, in a great many more cases, the course of their own lives. "No doubt" is the key. I can think of a couple of ways to account for such a phenomenon, neither entirely satisfying. The most straightforward and yet hardest to accept explanation is that it's simply true: the altered state of consciousness has opened the person up to a truth that the rest of us, imprisoned in ordinary waking consciousness, simply cannot see.

Sometimes the cause of civilization is best served by a hard stare into the soul of its opposite.

There is a lot more religion in science than you might expect.

Surrealism also refuses the representation of reality: reality can only be; its existence proves its reality. Fiction thereby becomes impossible or is, by definition, false.

But the truth enters at the end of life. It enters like oxygen into every cell and the madness it feeds there in some is only a lucid metaphor for something long burned to nothing, like a star. How do you get under your desire? How do you peel away each desire like ponderous clothes, one at a time, until what's underneath is known?

One time Allie and I skipped school and went to see this foreign film called Los Diablos, where these villagers found a glowing blue ball and peeled pieces off of it to see what was inside. Only the ball was really radioactive, and they all died from the poison. I think that's what happens when you look too deep inside for the truth. The poison comes out, and you die, even though you have beautiful glowing pieces of blue truth in your fingers.

Vieni con me, lettore! Chi ti ha detto che non esiste sulla terra un amore vero, fedele, eterno? Venga tagliata la ripugnante lingua al mentitore! Vieni con me, mio lettore, soltanto con me, e ti mostrerò questo amore!

When I express my opinions it is so as to reveal the measure of my sight not the measure of the thing.

Every other knowledge is harmful to him who does not have knowledge of goodness.

The reverse side of truth has a hundred thousand shapes and no defined limits.

We can be knowledgeable with another man's knowledge, but we can't be wise with another man's wisdom.

If it be well weighed, to say that a man lieth, is as much to say, as that he is brave towards God and a coward towards men.

Truth for us nowadays is not what is, but what others can be brought to accept: just as we call money not only legal tender but any counterfeit coins in circulation.

If you walk on stilts, you're still walking on your feet. If you sit on the highest throne in the world, you're still sitting on your ass.

I speak the truth not so much as I want, but as much as I dare, and I dare a little more as I grow older.

In truth, knowledge is a great and very useful quality; those who despise it give evidence enough of their stupidity. Yet I do not set its value at that extreme measure that some attribute to it, such as the philosopher Herillus, who find in it the sovereign good and think it has the power to make us wise and happy.

Our understanding is conducted solely by means of the word: anyone who falsifies it betrays public society. It is the only tool by which we communicate our wishes and our thoughts; it is our soul's interpreter: if we lack that, we can no longer hold together; we can no longer know each other. When words deceive us, it breaks all intercourse and loosens the bonds of our polity.

No one is exempt from speaking nonsense. The great misfortune is to do it solemnly.

No man is so exquisitely honest or upright in living, but that ten times in his life he might not lawfully be hanged.

Kings and philosophers shit, and so do ladies. Even on the highest throne in the world, we are seated still upon our arses.

Whatever it be, whether art or nature, that has inscribed in us this condition of living by reference to others, it does us much more harm than good. We defraud ourselves out of what is actually useful to us in order to make appearances conform to common opinion. We care less about the real truth of our inner selves than about how we are known to the public.