Quotes About Secrecy

This was in the days when I was making myself over. So difficult it was, to judge just so, to forge the fine discriminations, to maintain a balance--no one could know how difficult. If it had been a work of art I was fashioning they would have applauded my mastery. Perhaps that was my mistake, to do it all in secret, instead of openly, with a flourish. They would have been entertained; they would have forgiven me; Harlequin is always forgiven, always survives.

I guard my memories of my lost one jealously, keep them securely under wraps, like a folio of delicate watercolours that must be protected from the harsh light of day.

Supposedly nobody outside the group knew there was a group. Of course we all knew that wasn't true. High school was like the little clear plastic tunnels that Paul's hamsters lived in: you could run a long way but never get out, and always, everyone could see you.

More history is made by secret handshakes than by battles, bills and proclamations.

More history's made by secret handshakes than by battles, bills, and proclamations.

Toxically shamed people tend to become more and more stagnant as life goes on. They live in a guarded, secretive and defensive way. They try to be more than human (perfect and controlling) or less than human (losing interest in life or stagnated in some addictive behavior).

Usually it is not until there is evidence that the employee [who has changed jobs] has not lived up to his contract, expressed or implied, to maintain secrecy, that the former employer can take action. In the law of torts there is the maxim: Every dog has one free bite. A dog cannot be presumed to be vicious until he has proved that he is by biting someone. As with a dog, the former employer may have to wait for a former employee to commit some overt act before he can act.

Everything stayed hidden […] it was all secret – known by anyone who cared to know, but unacknowledged, like a priest's feverish brightness around adolescent boys, or the beatings Mrs Wilson endured on those Saturdays when Dumfermline lost at home(p. 83-84)

He will say less than he means, and conceal more than he reveals.

That is what we do for the ones we love: we lie to protect them. Not all truths are welcome.

She might suspect it, but I haven't met a mother yet who'd admit her child was out where the buses don't run, not without a fight." "But Mother must have signed off on Vincent Garronne

We are not meant to know the time or the nature of our deaths (for all of us secretly hope that we may be immortal).

My feelings for Raphael are mine, and mine alone. I loved him, and that is all anyone needs to know. The rest is no business of any man's.

A secret is not a thing you're not supposed to tell; it is a thing that can't be told.

It's a limited hang-out.

I have done one brave thing - Than all the Worthies did; And yet a braver thence doth spring - Which is to keep that hid

I have done one braver thingThan all the Worthies did;And yet a braver thence doth spring,Which is, to keep that hid.

When people try to hide things from you, they shouldn't be nice to you. They ought to ignore you or throw a pie at you or do something other than smile.

So many Americans felt that their neighbor had no right to know more than they did.

Duplicity is necessary in daily life, in that it covers many unpleasant things from sight, so they may not disturb the pleasure of others.

My life with Howard Hughes was and shall remain a matter on which I will have no comment.

All my life I've been hiding.

I have to protect my family and have a life with them that is completely private.

Everybody gets pinched but you did it right. You told them nothing and they got nothing. You learned the two greatest things in life: Never rat on your friends and always keep your mouth shut.