Quotes About Observation

I wanted to try this new drink. That's all we do, isn't it - look at things and try new drinks?

What was that?' Wallander said. [Linda] 'Nothing.' 'That's funny. I could have sworn you were swearing.' 'I didn't say anything.' 'I have a strange daughter,' Wallander said to Lindman. 'She curses without even knowing it.'

Patience, he would have said. When stones start rolling down a slope, it's important not to start running after them right away. Stay where you are and watch them rolling, see where they come to a stop. That's what he would have said.

other side of the fence? And who was that man? 5

He stared down at the empty street and wondered why all city streets resembled each other at night. He

Martinsson was at the other side of the table, watching him. 'He knows exactly what's going on inside my head at the moment,' Wallander thought, 'and he agrees with me, whether I speak up now or hold my tongue.

slowly peel away all the extraneous layers. There are tracks and marks left at every crime scene, like shadows of the event itself. That's what you have to find.

There's no such thing as a murderer's face," he said. "You imagine something: a profile, a hairline, a set of the jaw. But it never matches up.

It's always better to have four eyes look at something than two." "I'm not so sure about that," said Wallander

I asked him how he had been able to take such a splendid picture. With a smile he said, "Well, I had only to be very patient and very attentive. It was only after a few hours of compliments that the lily was willing to let me take her picture.

If you would convince a man that he does wrong, do right. But do not care to convince him. Men will believe what they see. Let them see.

It's not what you look at that matters, it's what you see.

There is just as much beauty visible to us in the landscape as we are prepared to appreciate, and not a grain more. ... A man sees only what concerns him.

The question is not what you look at, but what you see. It is only necessary to behold the least fact or phenomenon, however familiar, from a point a hair's breadth aside from our habitual path or routine, to be overcome, enchanted by its beauty and significance.

None can be an impartial or wise observer of human life but from the vantage ground of what we should call voluntary poverty.

The sea-shore is a sort of neutral ground, a most advantageous point from which to contemplate this world.

What is a course of history, or philosophy, or poetry, no matter how well selected, or the best society, or the most admirable routine of life, compared with the discipline of looking always at what is to be seen?

As far as I have heard or observed, the principal object is, not that mankind may be well and honestly clad, but, unquestionably, that corporations may be enriched.

Beauty is where it is perceived. When I see the sun shinning on the woods across the pond, I think this side the richer which sees it.

For many years I was self-appointed inspector of snow-storms and rain-storms, and did my duty faithfully; surveyor, if not of highways, then of forest paths and all across-lot routes, keeping them open, and ravines bridged and passable at all seasons, where the public heel had testified to their utility.

It is the beauty within us that makes it possible for us to recognize the beauty around us. The question is not what you look at but what you see.

Some circumstantial evidence is very strong, as when you find a trout in the milk.

We must look for a long time before we can see.

It is not worth the while to go round the world to count the cats in Zanzibar.