Quotes about the truth
page 14

“If you reject absolutely any single sensation without stopping to discriminate with respect to that which awaits confirmation between matter of opinion and that which is already present, whether in sensation or in feelings or in any immediate perception of the mind, you will throw into confusion even the rest of your sensations by your groundless belief and so you will be rejecting the standard of truth altogether. If in your ideas based upon opinion you hastily affirm as true all that awaits confirmation as well as that which does not, you will not escape error, as you will be maintaining complete ambiguity whenever it is a case of judging between right and wrong opinion.”

Epicurus (-341–-269 BC) ancient Greek philosopher

24
Sovereign Maxims

Error, Feeling, Idea

“I do not want any “yes- man„ around me. I want everybody to tell me the truth even if it costs them their jobs.”

Samuel Goldwyn (1879–1974) American film producer (1879-1974).

Funny

“Man is least himself when he talks in his own person. Give him a mask, and he will tell you the truth.”

Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) Irish writer and poet

The Critic as Artist (1891), Part II

For Men, Personality

“Everyone wishes to have truth on his side, but not everyone wishes to be on the side of the truth. ”

Ричард Уэйтли (1787–1863)

“Beauty is the splendor of truth.”

Plato (-427–-347 BC) Classical Greek philosopher

Beauty

“The truth cannot be told, it has to be realized.”

Ralph Smart

“The ultimate truth… If an egg is broken by an outside force, a life ends. If broken by an inside force, a life begins. You will find all the treasures of life, all the secrets of life inside you. Stop looking outside. Break the egg from inside, let life begin.”

Ralph Smart

Secret, Life

“We mistakenly equate flattery to friendship and criticism to opposition; one should evaluate truth first and then judge, for flattery and criticism are primarily opinion.”

Gandolfo – (RJ Intindola)

1975

Friendship

“Those in the dawn of life require nurturing from others; their personality traits and behaviors are formed during this period and they learn more from example and observation than words; reveal, kindness, truth, respect, and empathy for others.”

Gandolfo – (RJ Intindola)

1978

Life, Personality, Learning, Behavior

“I’d rather be hated by standing for what’s right than enduring emotional anguish for remaining silent; by remaining silent there is no confrontation nor truth and peace prevails.”

Gandolfo – (RJ Intindola)

2005

Peace, Hate

“There is not a single verse in the Qur’an calling for the unity or liberation specifically of the Arab nation. In fact the Qur’anic concept of Ummah i.e. nation is ideologically against any manifestations of nationalist tendencies. The Qur’an recommends unity of the whole human kind on the criteria of truth.”

Zakir Naik (1965) Islamic televangelist

In Is the Qur'an God's Word? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9RuQMD4yYWg

“It has often been said, that anything may be proved from the Bible, but before anything can be admitted as proved by the Bible, the Bible itself must be proved to be true; for if the Bible be not true, or the truth of it be doubtful, it ceases to have authority, and cannot be admitted as proof of anything.”

Thomas Paine book The Age of Reason

1790s, The Age of Reason, Part II (1795)

“Freedom had been hunted round the globe; reason was considered as rebellion; and the slavery of fear had made men afraid to think. But such is the irresistible nature of truth, that all it asks, — and all it wants, — is the liberty of appearing. The sun needs no inscription to distinguish him from darkness; and no sooner did the American governments display themselves to the world, than despotism felt a shock and man began to contemplate redress.”

Thomas Paine book Rights of Man

Part 2.2 Introduction
1790s, Rights of Man, Part 2 (1792)

Freedom, Sun, Nature, Thinking

“It is only when our consciences become tangled that the truth begins to hurt.”

Ivan Krylov (1769–1844) Russian writer

An argosy of fables, "The Rain cloud", translated by translation by William R. S. Ralston, p. 414
The Fables (1883)

Hurt

“We wish in our country that morality may be substituted for egotism, probity for false honour, principles for usages, duties for good manners, the empire of reason for the tyranny of fashion, a contempt of vice for a contempt of misfortune, pride for insolence, magnanimity for vanity, the love of glory for the love of money, good people for good company, merit for intrigue, genius for wit, truth for tinsel show, the attractions of happiness for the ennui of sensuality, the grandeur of man for the littleness of the great, a people magnanimous, powerful, happy, for a people amiable, frivolous and miserable; in a word, all the virtues and miracles of a Republic instead of all the vices and absurdities of a Monarchy.”

Maximilien Robespierre (1758–1794) French revolutionary lawyer and politician

Principles to Form the Basis of the Administration of the Republic (February 1794)

Money, Country, Making love, People

“A philosopher has remarked that if a man knew that he had thirty years of life before him, it would not be an unwise thing to spend twenty of those years in mapping out a plan of living, and putting himself under rule; for he would do more with the ten well-arranged years than with the whole thirty if he spent them at random. There is much truth in that saying. A man will do little by firing off his gun if he has not learned to take aim.”

Charles Spurgeon (1834–1892) British preacher, author, pastor and evangelist

A Good Start: A Book for Young Men and Women, (1898)

Life, Learning

“I have found more peace in the knowledge of truth than anger in the feeling of oppression, and the most precious fruit that I could want to collect in this memoir would be to inspire my readers with that peace of mind arising from the clear perception of evil and its causes.”

Pierre Joseph Proudhon (1809–1865) French politician, mutualist philosopher, economist, and socialist

Preface
What is Property? (1840)

Peace, Anger, Knowledge, Feeling

“Now, this research work about the science of God has to be prosecuted for several births after births… God realization, it is very easy, but at the same time, it is very difficult. Easy for them who accept it as truth, and those who are trying to understand by dint of his knowledge, advancement of knowledge, he has to create his faith after he finishes his research work. Then that takes many, many births.”

A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada (1896–1977) Indian guru

Lecture on Bhagavad-gita, Chapter 7, verse 18; New York; http://prabhupadabooks.com/classes/bg/7/18/new_york/october/12/1966?d=1 (12 October 1966)

God, Faith, Time, Understanding

“Following in the footsteps of Maharaja Pariksit, it is the duty of all executive heads of states to see that the principles of religion, namely austerity, cleanliness, mercy and truthfulness, are established in the state, and that the principles of irreligion, namely pride, illicit female association or prostitution, intoxication and falsity, are checked by all means.”

A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada (1896–1977) Indian guru

Religion

“If, by the virtue of charity or the circumstance of desperation, you ever chance to spend a little time around a Substance-recovery halfway facility like Enfield MA’s state-funded Ennet House, you will acquire many exotic new facts…That certain persons simply will not like you no matter what you do. That sleeping can be a form of emotional escape and can with sustained effort be abused. That purposeful sleep-deprivation can also be an abusable escape. That you do not have to like a person in order to learn from him/her/it. That loneliness is not a function of solitude. That logical validity is not a guarantee of truth. That it takes effort to pay attention to any one stimulus for more than a few seconds. That boring activities become, perversely, much less boring if you concentrate intently on them. That if enough people in a silent room are drinking coffee it is possible to make out the sound of steam coming off the coffee. That sometimes human beings have to just sit in one place and, like, hurt. That you will become way less concerned with what other people think of you when you realize how seldom they do. That there is such a thing as raw, unalloyed, agendaless kindness. That it is possible to fall asleep during an anxiety attack. That concentrating intently on anything is very hard work. That 99% of compulsive thinkers’ thinking is about themselves; that 99% of this self-directed thinking consists of imagining and then getting ready for things that are going to happen to them; and then, weirdly, that if they stop to think about it, that 100% of the things they spend 99% of their time and energy imagining and trying to prepare for all the contingencies and consequences of are never good. In short that 99% of the head’s thinking activity consists of trying to scare the everliving shit out of itself. That it is possible to make rather tasty poached eggs in a microwave oven. That some people’s moms never taught them to cover up or turn away when they sneeze. That the people to be the most frightened of are the people who are the most frightened. That it takes great personal courage to let yourself appear weak. That no single, individual moment is in and of itself unendurable. That other people can often see things about you that you yourself cannot see, even if those people are stupid. That having a lot of money does not immunize people from suffering or fear. That trying to dance sober is a whole different kettle of fish. That different people have radically different ideas of basic personal hygiene. That, perversely, it is often more fun to want something than to have it. That if you do something nice for somebody in secret, anonymously, without letting the person you did it for know it was you or anybody else know what it was you did or in any way or form trying to get credit for it, it’s almost its own form of intoxicating buzz. That anonymous generosity, too, can be abused. That it is permissible to want. That everybody is identical in their unspoken belief that way deep down they are different from everyone else. That this isn’t necessarily perverse. That there might not be angels, but there are people who might as well be angels.”

David Foster Wallace book Infinite Jest

Infinite Jest (1996)

Hurt, Imagination, Housing, Personality

“A man who makes assertions, or draws conclusions, regarding any given case, ought to be competent to investigate it. He has no right to throw the onus on others, declaring it their duly to prove him right or wrong. His duty is to demonstrate the truth of that which he asserts, or to cease from asserting. The men he calls upon to consider and judge have enough to do with themselves, in the examination, correction, or verification of their own views. The world little knows how many of the thoughts and theories which have passed through the mind of a scientific investigator have been crushed in silence and secrecy by his own severe criticism and adverse examination; that in the most successful instances not a tenth of the suggestions, the hopes, the wishes, the preliminary conclusions have been realized.”

Michael Faraday book Experimental researches in chemistry and physics

"Observations on Mental Education" (May 6, 1854) a lecture before His Royal Highness The Prince Consort and the Members of the Royal Institution, Lectures on Education (1855) as quoted in Faraday's Experimental Researches in Chemistry and Physics (1859) p. 486. https://books.google.com/books?id=AUwNAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA486

Drawing, Success, Silence, Hope

“Lenin cannot be chopped up into quotations suited for every possible case, because for Lenin the formula never stands higher than the reality; it is always the tool that makes it possible to grasp the reality and to dominate it. It would not be hard to find in Lenin dozens and hundreds of passages which, formally speaking, seem to be contradictory. But what must be seen is not the formal relationship of one passage to another, but the real relationship of each of them to the concrete reality in which the formula was introduced as a lever. The Leninist truth is always concrete!”

Leon Trotsky (1879–1940) Marxist revolutionary from Russia

The New Course (1924)

Reality, Making love

“The March on Washington teaches us that we are not trapped by the mistakes of history; that we are masters of our fate. But it also teaches us that the promise of this nation will only be kept when we work together. We’ll have to reignite the embers of empathy and fellow feeling, the coalition of conscience that found expression in this place 50 years ago. And I believe that spirit is there, that truth force inside each of us. I see it when a white mother recognizes her own daughter in the face of a poor black child. I see it when the black youth thinks of his own grandfather in the dignified steps of an elderly white man. It’s there when the native-born recognizing that striving spirit of the new immigrant; when the interracial couple connects the pain of a gay couple who are discriminated against and understands it as their own. That’s where courage comes from -- when we turn not from each other, or on each other, but towards one another, and we find that we do not walk alone. That’s where courage comes from.”

Barack Obama (1961) 44th President of the United States of America

2013, "Let Freedom Ring" Ceremony (August 2013)

Courage, Pain, History, Fate

“Americanism means the virtues of courage, honor, justice, truth, sincerity, and hardihood—the virtues that made America. The things that will destroy America are prosperity-at-any-price, peace-at-any-price, safety-first instead of duty-first, the love of soft living and the get-rich-quick theory of life.”

Theodore Roosevelt (1858–1919) American politician, 26th president of the United States

Letter to S. Stanwood Menken, chairman, committee on Congress of Constructive Patriotism (January 10, 1917). Roosevelt’s sister, Mrs. Douglas Robinson, read the letter to a national meeting, January 26, 1917. Reported in Proceedings of the Congress of Constructive Patriotism, Washington, D.C., January 25–27, 1917 (1917), p. 172
1910s

Courage, Peace, Justice, Sincerity

“I made the trip knowing I was like the child putting his finger into the hole in the dike. And there are things that … I don’t know … one can’t … oh, why not! The truth is that I spoke clearly to Mr. Nixon. And I told him what I had already told Mr. Heath, Mr. Pompidou, Mr. Brandt. I told him without mincing words that we couldn’t go on with ten million refugees on our backs, we couldn’t tolerate the fuse of such and explosive situation any longer. Well, Mr. Heath, Mr. Pompidou, and Mr. Brandt had understood very well. But not Mr. Nixon. The fact is that when the others understand one thing, Mr. Nixon understands another. I suspected he was very pro-Pakistan. Or rather I knew that the Americans had always been in favor of Pakistan—not so much because they were in favor of Pakistan, but because they were against India.”

Indíra Gándhí (1917–1984) Indian politician and Prime Minister

Oriana Fallaci. Interview with Indira Gandhi in New Delhi, February 1972

Understanding

“Mathematics, rightly viewed, possesses not only truth, but supreme beauty – a beauty cold and austere, like that of sculpture, without appeal to any part of our weaker nature, without the gorgeous trappings of painting or music, yet sublimely pure, and capable of a stern perfection such as only the greatest art can show. The true spirit of delight, the exaltation, the sense of being more than Man, which is the touchstone of highest excellence, is to be found in mathematics as surely as in poetry. What is best in mathematics deserves not merely to be learnt as a task, but to be assimilated as a part of daily thought, and brought again and again before the mind with ever-renewed encouragement.”

Bertrand Russell (1872–1970) logician, one of the first analytic philosophers and political activist

1900s, "The Study of Mathematics" (November 1907)

Painting, Beauty, Nature, Music

“A critic never made or killed a book or a play. The people themselves are the final judges. It is their opinion that counts. After all, the final test is truth. But the trouble is that most writers regard truth as their most valuable possession and therefore are most economical in its use.”

Mark Twain (1835–1910) American author and humorist

Said to portrait painter Samuel Johnson Woolf, cited in Here am I (1941), Samuel Johnson Woolf; this has often been abbreviated: Most writers regard truth as their most valuable possession, and therefore are most economical in its use.

Books, People

“Truth to tell, treaties are only oaths of deception and faithlessness. The jurisprudence of sovereigns is customarily the law of the strongest.”

Frederick II of Prussia (1712–1786) king of Prussia

Preface to “Histoire de mon temps”, Works (1743), quoted in W. W. Coole (ed.), Thus Spake Germany (London: George Routledge & Sons, 1941), p. 82

Law

“For this companion volume to A New Earth, I selected passages from the original book that felt particularly suitable for inspirational or meditative reading. For this reason I do not recommend that you read this book straight through from cover to cover. It would be far more beneficial to read, at the most, one chapter at a time, stopping at and perhaps rereading whatever passages elicit an inner response. Then let the words sink in and sense the truth to which they point, which is, of course, already within you. It can also be helpful to open the book at random occasionally, read one page or just one passage and let the words point the way to that dimension deep within that is beyond words, beyond thought. The truth to which the words point, the timeless dimension of consciousness, cannot be arrived at through discursive thought and conceptual understanding.”

Eckhart Tolle (1948) German writer

From The Introduction https://eckharttolle.com/oneness-with-all-life-excerpt/ Oneness With All Life: Inspirational Selections from A New Earth (2008)

Time, Reading, Understanding, Help

“Socialism and rationalism are to this day the touchstones of humanity, the rocks which lie in the course of revolution and science. Groups of swimmers, driven by reflection or the waves of circumstance against these rocks, break up at once into two camps, which, under different disguises, remain the same throughout all history, and may be distinguished either in a great political party or in a group of a dozen young men. One represents logic; the other, history: one stands for dialectics; the other for evolution. Truth is the main object of the former, and feasibility of the latter.”

Alexander Herzen book My Past and Thoughts

ibid, Ch. 8, s. 12
My Past and Thoughts(1852-1870)

History, Lie, Science, Men

“May I really say it! All truths are bloody truths to me—take a look at my previous writings.”

Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) German philosopher, poet, composer, cultural critic, and classical philologist

Notebooks (Summer 1880) 4[271]

“This is a painful bit of truth: Fascism, in the form of irresponsibility, is present in the masses of all countries, nations and races. Fascism is the result of thousands of years of warping of the human structure. It could have developed in any nation. It is not a specific German or Italian character trait. It works in every mortal.”

Wilhelm Reich book The Mass Psychology of Fascism

Section 2 : The Biological Miscalculation in the Human Struggle for Freedom
The Mass Psychology of Fascism (1933), Ch. 10 : Work Democracy

Pain, Country

“Everybody wants me to show my vagina to the world. And the truth is, I don’t have to.”

Lady Gaga (1986) American singer, songwriter, and actress

Interview for Maxim Magazine.

World

“I found the speech, after listening to it in context, vile in manner, repugnant, malicious, mean-spirited and spoken in mockery of individuals and people, which is against the spirit of Islam. While I stand by the truths that he spoke, I must condemn in the strongest terms the manner in which those truths were represented.”

Khalid Abdul Muhammad (1948–2001) American activist

Louis Farrakhan, dismissing Khalid from his Nation of Islam post. See New York Times (4 February 1994) "Farrakhan Repudiates Speech For Tone, Not Anti-Semitism"
About Khalid

People

“While fame impedes and constricts, obscurity wraps about a man like a mist; obscurity is dark, ample, and free; obscurity lets the mind take its way unimpeded. Over the obscure man is poured the merciful suffusion of darkness. None knows where he goes or comes. He may seek the truth and speak it; he alone is free; he alone is truthful, he alone is at peace.”

Virginia Woolf book Orlando: A Biography

Source: Orlando: A Biography (1928), Ch. 2

Way, Peace

“Naturally, every age thinks that all ages before it were prejudiced, and today we think this more than ever and are just as wrong as all previous ages that thought so. How often have we not seen the truth condemned! It is sad but unfortunately true that man learns nothing from history.”

C.G. Jung book Synchronicity: An Acausal Connecting Principle

Source: Synchronicity: An Acausal Connecting Principle (1960), p. 33

History, Learning, Nature, Thinking

“The worst thing you could do in your life is to be determined NOT TO BE AFFECTED by life. This is the harm that the glorification of the "enlightened guru" has done to us. The enlightened guru seems unaffected by life. This could not be further from the truth. The enlightened person lets himself be completely penetrated by life, but in the absence of resistance to that penetration, in the absence of resistance to being affected, there is nothing in him for life to injure or destroy. If you strive to be unaffected by life, the resistance you have is to FEELING.”

Teal Swan (1984) American spiritual teacher

Life, Feeling, Personality

“The opposite of every great truth is also a great truth”

Niels Bohr (1885–1962) Danish physicist

“There’s very little places, virtually no places obviously in the corporate media apparatus that you can tell the truth to challenge corporate tyranny and this US imperialist narrative of constant regime change all around the world... It’s a very dangerous and slippery slope that we’re on and I just think it’s time that we take a step back and actually fund the journalists that we want to see...”

Abby Martin (1984) American journalist

Quoted in Curating our reality: Investigative journalist Abby Martin takes aim at US media hegemony, RT.com https://www.rt.com/news/437721-abby-martin-telesur-sanctions/ (5 September 2018)

Time, Thinking, World, Change

“This new patriarch Fox said one day to a justice of peace, before a large assembly of people. "Friend, take care what thou dost; God will soon punish thee for persecuting his saints." This magistrate, being one who besotted himself every day with bad beer and brandy, died of apoplexy two days after; just as he had signed a mittimus for imprisoning some Quakers. The sudden death of this justice was not ascribed to his intemperance; but was universally looked upon as the effect of the holy man's predictions; so that this accident made more Quakers than a thousand sermons and as many shaking fits would have done. Cromwell, finding them increase daily, was willing to bring them over to his party, and for that purpose tried bribery; however, he found them incorruptible, which made him one day declare that this was the only religion he had ever met with that could resist the charms of gold.
The Quakers suffered several persecutions under Charles II; not upon a religious account, but for refusing to pay the tithes, for "theeing" and "thouing" the magistrates, and for refusing to take the oaths enacted by the laws.
At length Robert Barclay, a native of Scotland, presented to the king, in 1675, his "Apology for the Quakers"; a work as well drawn up as the subject could possibly admit. The dedication to Charles II, instead of being filled with mean, flattering encomiums, abounds with bold truths and the wisest counsels. "Thou hast tasted," says he to the king, at the close of his "Epistle Dedicatory," "of prosperity and adversity: thou hast been driven out of the country over which thou now reignest, and from the throne on which thou sittest: thou hast groaned beneath the yoke of oppression; therefore hast thou reason to know how hateful the oppressor is both to God and man. If, after all these warnings and advertisements, thou dost not turn unto the Lord, with all thy heart; but forget Him who remembered thee in thy distress, and give thyself up to follow lust and vanity, surely great will be thy guilt, and bitter thy condemnation. Instead of listening to the flatterers about thee, hearken only to the voice that is within thee, which never flatters. I am thy faithful friend and servant, Robert Barclay."”

Voltaire (1694–1778) French writer, historian, and philosopher

The most surprising circumstance is that this letter, though written by an obscure person, was so happy in its effect as to put a stop to the persecution.
The History of the Quakers (1762)

God, Peace, Religion, Beer

“If we fail to instruct our children in justice, religion and liberty, we will be condemning them to a world without virtue, a life in the twilight of a civilization, where the great truths have been forgotten.”

Ronald Reagan (1911–2004) American politician, 40th president of the United States (in office from 1981 to 1989)

[The Goals Program. How to Stay Motivated, Volume III, chapter 5, Zig Ziglar]
Attributed

Religion, Justice, Children, World

“One afternoon, which is ever present in my recollection, I was enjoying a walk with my friend in the city park and reciting poetry. At that age I knew entire books by heart, word for word. One of these was Goethe's Faust. The sun was just setting and reminded me of a glorious passage:
Sie rückt und weicht, der Tag ist überlebt,
Dort eilt sie hin und fördert neues Leben.
O! daß kein Flügel mich vom Boden hebt,
Ihr nach und immer nach zu streben!
Ein schöner Traum, indessen sie entweicht.
Ach! zu des Geistes Flügeln wird so leicht
Kein körperlicher Flügel sich gesellen![The glow retreats, done is the day of toil;
It yonder hastes, new fields of life exploring;
Ah, that no wing can lift me from the soil
Upon its track to follow, follow soaring!
A glorious dream! though now the glories fade.
Alas! the wings that lift the mind no aid
Of wings to lift the body can bequeath me.
(tr. Bayard Taylor)
As I uttered these inspiring words the idea came like a flash of lightning and in an instant the truth was revealed. I drew with a stick on the sand the diagram shown six years later in my address before the American Institute of Electrical Engineers, and my companion understood them perfectly. The images I saw were wonderfully sharp and clear and had the solidity of metal and stone, so much so that I told him, "See my motor here; watch me reverse it."”

Nikola Tesla (1856–1943) Serbian American inventor

I cannot begin to describe my emotions. Pygmalion seeing his statue come to life could not have been more deeply moved. A thousand secrets of nature which I might have stumbled upon accidentally, I would have given for that one which I had wrested from her against all odds and at the peril of my existence …

On the Invention of the Induction Motor
My Inventions (1919)

Sun, Dreams, Heart, Books

“In God is my being, my I, my strength, my bliss, my desire. But this I that I often call so...in truth I no longer know what the I is, or the Mine, or desire, or the good, or bliss.”

Catherine of Genoa (1447–1510) Italian author and nurse

P. 108.

God

“I advise you to fear Allah alone, with no partner of associate. I advise you to treat the first Muhâjireen well and acknowledge their seniority. I advise you to treat the Ansār well, and show approval of those among them who do well, and forgive those among them who make mistakes. I advise you to treat the people of the outlying regions well, for they are a shield against the enemy and conduits of fay; do not take anything from them except that which is surplus to their needs. I advise you to treat the people of the desert well, for they are the original Arabs and the protectors of Islam. Take from the surplus of their wealth and give it to their poor. I advise you to treat ahl adh-dhīmmah well, to defend them against their enemies and not burden them with more than they can bear if they fulfill their duties towards the believers or pay the Jizyāh with willing submission, and feel themselves subdued. I advise you to fear Allah and fear His wrath, lest you do anything wrong. I advise you to fear Allah with regard to the people, but do not fear the people with regard to Allah. I advise you to treat the people justly, and to devote yourself to looking after them and protecting them against their enemies. Do not show any favour to the rich over the poor. That will be better for your spiritual well being and will help to reduce your burden of sin, and it will be better for your Hereafter, until you meet the One Who knows what is in your heart. I instruct you to be strict with regard to the commands of Allah, His sacred limits and disobedience with all people, both relatives and others. Do not show any mercy to anyone until you have settled the score with him according to his offence. Treat all people as equal, and do not worry about who is as fault or fear the blame of the blamers. Beware of showing favouritism among the believers with regard to the fay that Allah has put you in charge of, lest that lead to injustice. Keep away from that. You are in a position between this world and the Hereafter. If you conduct your affairs justly in this world and refrain from indulgence, that will earn you faith and divine pleasure. I advise you not to let yourself or anyone else do wrong to ahl al-dhimmah. I advise you sincerely to seek thereby the Countenance of Allah and the Hereafter. I have chosen advice for you that I would offer to myself or my son. If you do as I have advised you and follow my instructions, you will have gained a great deal. If you don not accept it or pay attention to it, and do not handle your affairs in the way that pleases Allah, that will be a shortcoming on your part and you will have failed to be sincere, because whims and desires are the same and the cause of sin is Iblīs, who calls man to everything that will lead to his doom. He misguided the generations who came before you and led them to Hell, what a terrible abode. What a bad deal it is for a man to take the enemy of Allah as his friend, who calls him to disobey Allah. Adhere to the truth, strive hard to reach it and admonish yourself. I urge you by Allah to show mercy to the Muslims, honour their elderly, show compassion to their young ones and respect the knowledgeable ones among them. Do not harm them or humiliate them, and do not keep the fay for yourself lest you anger them. Do not deprive them of their stipends when they become due, thus making them poor. Do not keep them away on campaigns for so long that they end up having no children. Do not allow wealth to circulate only among the rich. Do not close your door to the people or allow the strong to oppress the weak. This is my advice to you, as Allah is my witness, and I greet you with peace.”

Umar (585–644) Second Caliph of Rashidun Caliphate and a companion of Muhammad

Umar ibn al-Khattab, Vol. 2, p. 389-390, also quoted in At-Tabqaat ul-Kabir, Vol. 3, p. 339
Last Advise

Sincerity, Forgiveness, Hell, Anger

“Neither force nor manipulate others into following you. Rather dedicate your life to the highest truth and let the magnetism of truth itself pull people to you.”

Govinda Bhagavatpada Indian philosopher advaita vendatna

The Himalayan Masters: A Living Tradition (2002)

Life, People

“It is a good shrewd proverb of the Spaniard, Tell a lie and find a truth.”

Francis Bacon (1561–1626) English philosopher, statesman, scientist, jurist, and author

The Essays Or Counsels, Civil And Moral, Of Francis Ld. Verulam Viscount St. Albans (1625), Of Simulation And Dissimulation

Lie

“Another ancient poet, whose name I have forgotten, said that Truth is the daughter of Time.”

Aulus Gellius book Noctes Atticae

Noctes Atticae, XII, 11, 7.
Original: (la) Alius quidam veterum poetarum, cuius nomen mihi nunc memoriae non est, Veritatem Temporis filiam esse dixit.

Time, Daughters

“The sin is about our notion of what is right and what is wrong, and how we bend the truth based on we want and I think. In Catholicism, we tend to do this a lot, and I think it’s very interesting and very beautiful yet very disturbing at the same time. A miracle is about believing and having faith. I think that it these times, and in Mexico, we have been to the point where we have been loosing [sic] faith. It’s really important for me to remind myself that I must continue on having faith, in my people, in my nation, in the woman, and in all the beautiful things that my country represents.”

Lila Downs (1968) Mexican American singer-songwriter

On the notion of faith and how it might apply to Mexico and its peoples in “Q&A: Lila Downs, A Sin and A Miracle” https://remezcla.com/music/lila-downs-sin-miracle-pecados-milagros-interview/ in Remezcla (c. 2011) Heritage and indigenous peoples

Faith, Time, Country, Beauty

“As to riots and tumults, let those answer for them, who, by willful misrepresentations, endeavor to excite and promote them; or who seek to stun the sense of the nation, and to lose the great cause of public good in the outrages of a misinformed mob. We take our ground on principles that require no such riotous aid. We have nothing to apprehend from the poor; for we are pleading their cause. And we fear not proud oppression, for we have truth on our side.”

Thomas Paine (1737–1809) English and American political activist

Source: Address And Declaration At a Select Meeting Of The Friends Of Universal Peace And Liberty https://thomaspaine.org/essays/french-revolution/address-and-declaration.html (August 20, 1791)

Sense, Fear

“I want, when they see me, They know that everyday when I'm breathing is for us to go further. Everytime I speak I want the truth to come out. Not one person even realizes that I have white relatives, my cousin just had a son who is “White” but everytime I speak I want a shiver so yes, I do omit things that I feel are not accurately portraying my “character.””

Tupac Shakur (1971–1996) rapper and actor

I don't want them to be like; they know what I'm gonna say, because it's polite. Im not saying I'm gonna rule the world or I'm gonna change the world, but I guarantee you that I will spark the brain that will change the world. And that's our job, It's to spark somebody else watching us. We might not be the one's, but let's not be selfish and because we not gonna change the world let's not talk about how we should change it. I don't know how to change it, but I know if I keep talking about how dirty it is out here, somebody's gonna clean it up.
1990s, MTV interview (1994)

Feeling, Personality

“Western philosophy and science have for the most part been committed to the Simplicity Theory of Truth: the simplest theory that accounts for the data is the true theory. (Theories are simplest which postulate the fewest entities, require the fewest hypotheses, generate predictions by the fewest calculations, etc.) ...If someone believes that the world is made for him to have dominion over and he is made to exploit it, he must believe that he and the world are so made that he can, at least in principle, achieve and maintain dominion over everything. But you can’t put things to use if you don’t know how they work. So he must believe that he can, at least in principle, understand everything. If the world exists for man, it must be usably intelligible, which means it must be simple enough for him to understand. A usable universe is an intelligible universe is a simple universe. ...And so it goes with the philosophy and the science of The Arrogant Eye.”

Marilyn Frye book The Politics of Reality

Source: The Politics of Reality: Essays in Feminist Theory (1983), p. 71

Understanding, Intelligence, Universe, World

“Truth was the only daughter of Time.”

Leonardo Da Vinci (1452–1519) Italian Renaissance polymath

The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci (1883), XIX Philosophical Maxims. Morals. Polemics and Speculations.

Time, Daughters

“Liberate yourself from concepts and see the truth with your own eyes.”

Bruce Lee (1940–1973) Hong Kong-American actor, martial artist, philosopher and filmmaker

It exists HERE and NOW; it requires only one thing to see it: openness, freedom — the freedom to be open and not tethered by any ideas, concepts, etc. … When our mind is tranquil, there will be an occasional pause to its feverish activities, there will be a let-go, and it is only then in the interval between two thoughts that a flash of UNDERSTANDING — understanding, which is not thought — can take place.
Source: Striking Thoughts (2000), p. 43

“Knowledge rests not upon truth alone, but upon error also.”

C.G. Jung (1875–1961) Swiss psychiatrist and psychotherapist who founded analytical psychology

Knowledge, Error

“All fixed set patterns are incapable of adaptability or pliability. The truth is outside of all fixed patterns.”

Bruce Lee (1940–1973) Hong Kong-American actor, martial artist, philosopher and filmmaker

“Always tell the truth. That way, you don't have to remember what you said.”

Mark Twain (1835–1910) American author and humorist

Way

“We know the truth, not only by the reason, but by the heart.”

Blaise Pascal (1623–1662) French mathematician, physicist, inventor, writer, and Christian philosopher

Heart

“A youth, when at home, should be filial and, abroad, respectful to his elders. He should be earnest and truthful. He should overflow in love to all and cultivate the friendship of the good. When he has time and opportunity, after the performance of these things, he should employ them in polite studies.”

Confucius (-551–-479 BC) Chinese teacher, editor, politician, and philosopher

Home, Study, Friendship, Youth

“I see without eyes, and I hear without ears. I feel without feeling and taste without tasting. I know neither form nor measure; for without seeing I yet behold an operation so divine that the words I first used, perfection, purity, and the like, seem to me now mere lies in the presence of truth. . . . Nor can I any longer say, “My God, my all.””

Catherine of Genoa (1447–1510) Italian author and nurse

Everything is mine, for all that is God’s seem to be wholly mine. I am mute and lost in God...God so transforms the soul in Him that it knows nothing other than God, and He continues to draw it up into His fiery love until He restores it to that pure state from which it first issued
Source: Life and Doctrine, p. 50

God, Perfection, Feeling

“When words stop meaning anything, when truth doesn’t matter, when people can just lie with abandon, democracy can’t work.”

Barack Obama (1961) 44th President of the United States of America

Speech at political rally on November 2, 2018. Source: Obama rips hecklers: Why are the people who won the last election ‘so mad all the time?' https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2018/11/03/obama-rips-hecklers-why-are-people-who-won-last-election-so-mad-all-time/ 2018

Democracy, People, Lie

“The greater Truth is that you are the awareness within which the idea of yourself living a life and having awareness is appearing. In other words, the ‘person’ we take ourselves to be is an idea emerging in consciousness as an expression of consciousness.”

Mooji (1954) Jamaican spiritual teacher

Greater than Sky, Vaster than Space, (2018), Part I

Personality, Appearance, Idea, Life

“Truth is what we are. It is our essential nature and Being. It is the pure Self, the limitless one, the ultimate reality – it is awareness itself.”

Mooji (1954) Jamaican spiritual teacher

Greater than Sky, Vaster than Space, (2018), Part I

Reality, Nature

“It is a mistake, too, to say that the face is the mirror of the soul. The truth is, men are very hard to know, and yet, not to be deceived, we must judge them by their present actions, but for the present only.”

Napoleon I of France (1769–1821) French general, First Consul and later Emperor of the French

Napoleon : In His Own Words (1916)

Soul, Men

“Your mind and soul will never find rest until the day you decide to feed them the truth.”

Mwanandeke Kindembo (1996) Congolese author

Soul

“With a fascist the problem is never how best to present the truth to the public but how best to use the news to deceive the public.”

Henry A. Wallace (1888–1965) Vice President of the United States

Quoted by Thom Hartmann in Fascists Compete To Own America, Common Dreams, https://www.commondreams.org/views/2018/04/30/fascists-compete-own-america (30 April 2018)

Problem

“Grant us the single heart once more
That mocks no sacred thing,
The Sword of Truth our fathers wore
When Thou wast Lord and King. Let darkness unto darkness tell
Our deep unspoken prayer;
For, while our souls in darkness dwell,
We know that Thou art there.”

Alfred Noyes (1880–1958) English poet

Dedication, later published as "A Prayer in Time of War"
A Belgian Christmas Eve (1915)

Soul, Heart, Art

“When the intention is to spread Islam and annihilate non-Muslims, two widely discussed methods are love jihad and narcotics jihad. There is a section of people who want to establish that no such thing exists in our society today. They are trying to conceal the truth and reality.”

Joseph Kallarangatt (1956) Indian Syro-Malabar Catholic Church Bishop

India: Bishop decries ‘love jihad’ and ‘drug jihad,’ ‘In the eyes of a jihadi, non-Muslims are to be destroyed’ https://www.jihadwatch.org/2021/09/india-bishop-decries-love-jihad-and-drug-jihad-in-the-eyes-of-a-jihadi-non-muslims-are-to-be-destroyed (september 13, 2021)

People, Reality, Love

“I can see him. I know that God is real. I know it in my heart. You can only believe in what you know to be true. You know your own truth. I know mine. Everyone should be able to find that within themselves.”

Rachel Scott (1981–1999) American murder victim

Source: As quoted in No Easy Answers: The Truth Behind Death at Columbine https://books.google.com/books?id=kI4YwhBD7FgC&pg=PA149 (2002), by Brooks Brown and Rob Merritt, New York: Lantern Books, p. 149

God, Heart

“Though Divine knowledge transcends all thoughts and symbols, yet the mystic's sincere meditation discovers the Ultimare Truth.”

Muhammad ibn Abd al-Jabbar ibn al-Hasan al-Niffari

Source: The Sayings and Teachings of the Great Mystics of Islam (2004), p. 81

Knowledge, Sincerity

“The best way to travel, after all, is to feel,
To feel everything in every way,
To feel everything excessively,
Because all things are, in truth, excessive
And all reality is an excess, a violence,
An extraordinarily vivid hallucination.”

Fernando Pessoa (1888–1935) Portuguese poet, writer, literary critic, translator, publisher and philosopher

Source: Book, « Ode Marítima »

Reality, Way, Travel, Feeling

“It is truth that liberates, not your effort to be free.”

Jiddu Krishnamurti (1895–1986) Indian spiritual philosopher

Effort

“A person is strong only when he stands upon his own truth, when he speaks and acts from his deepest convictions. Then, whatever the situation he may be in, he always knows what he must say and do. He may fall, but he cannot bring shame upon himself or his cause. If we seek the liberation of the people by means of a lie, we will surely grow confused, go astray, and lose sight of our objective, and if we have any influence at all on the people we will lead them astray as well — in other words, we will be acting in the spirit of reaction and to its benefit.”

Mikhail Bakunin book Statism and Anarchy

Source: Statism and Anarchy (1873), "Appendix A"

Personality, Strong, People, Lie

“Confusion, anger, depression, violence, and conflict arise when humans forget who they are. Yet how easy it is to remember the truth and thus return home: I am not my thoughts, emotions, sense perceptions, and experiences. I am not the content of my life. I am Life. I am the space in which all things happen. I am consciousness. I am the Now. I Am.”

Eckhart Tolle (1948) German writer

Source: Stillness Speaks (2003), Ch 4

Home, Anger, Forgetting, Sense

“The Truth is far more all-encompassing than the mind could ever comprehend. No thought can encapsulate the Truth. At best, it can point to it. For example, it can say: “All things are intrinsically one.” That is a pointer, not an explanation. Understanding these words means feeling deep within you the truth to which they point.”

Eckhart Tolle (1948) German writer

Source: Stillness Speaks (2003), Ch 2

Understanding, Feeling

“The form of this book can be seen as a revival for the present age of the oldest form of recorded spiritual teachings: the sutras of ancient India. Sutras are powerful pointers to the truth in the form of aphorisms or short sayings, with little conceptual elaboration. The Vedas and Upanishads are the early sacred teachings recorded in the form of sutras, as are the words of the Buddha. The sayings and parables of Jesus, too, when taken out of their narrative context, could be regarded as sutras, as well as the profound teachings contained in the Tao Te Ching, the ancient Chinese book of wisdom. The advantage of the sutra form lies in its brevity...”

Eckhart Tolle (1948) German writer

Source: Stillness Speaks (2003), intro

Books, Age, Wisdom

“A true spiritual teacher does not have anything to teach in the conventional sense of the word, does not have anything to give or add to you, such as new information, beliefs, or rules of conduct. The only function of such a teacher is to help you remove that which separates you from the truth of who you already are and what you already know in the depth of your being.”

Eckhart Tolle (1948) German writer

Source: Stillness Speaks (2003), Introduction

Teachers, Help, Sense

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“Credulity [...] is not a crime, but it becomes criminal by resisting conviction. It is strangling in the womb of the conscience the efforts it makes to ascertain truth. We should never force belief upon ourselves in any thing.”

Thomas Paine book The Age of Reason

1790s, The Age of Reason, Part II (1795), The New Testament

Effort

“I speak a language full and intelligible. I deal not in hints and intimations. [...] First, that I may be clearly understood. Secondly, that it may be seen I am in earnest; and, thirdly, because it is an affront to truth to treat falsehood with complaisance.”

Thomas Paine book The Age of Reason

1790s, The Age of Reason, Part III (1807)

Intelligence

“If you woke, then wake up
With Judas, kiss and make up
Even with the bitter cup
Forgave my brothers and drank up Everything old shall now become new
The leaves’ll be green, bearing the fruit
Love God and our neighbor, as written in Luke
The army of God, and we are the truth.”

Kanye West (1977) American rapper, singer and songwriter

Selah
Lyrics, Jesus Is King (2019)

God, Kiss, Love

“Sometimes I take all the shine
Talk like I drank all the wine
Years ahead but way behind
I'm on one, two, three, four, five
No half-truths, just naked minds
Caught between space and time
This not what they had in mind
But maybe someday...”

Kanye West (1977) American rapper, singer and songwriter

Ghost Town
Lyrics, Ye (2018)

Time, Way, Wine

“Preach the Truth as if you had a million voices. It is silence that kills the world.”

Catherine of Siena (1347–1380) Italian Dominican saint

quoted in [LifeSite, The heart of the Catholic Church's current crisis is the abandonment of law and doctrine - LifeSite, 2022-06-07, 2022-05-05, https://www.lifesitenews.com/opinion/the-heart-of-the-catholic-churchs-current-crisis-is-the-abandonment-of-law-and-doctrine/] Variant versions: I see the world is rotten because of silence … speak the truth in a million voices. It is silence that kills. (quoted at 0:23 of [Randall Terry, The Silence That Kills, 2022-06-07, 2020-10-19, 23:29, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ql2ncPIgui0]) Original Italian: Oimé, non più tacere! Gridate con centomiglia di lingue. Veggo che, per lo tacere, el mondo è guasto, la Sposa di Cristo è impalidita ( Lettera 16, "A uno grande prelato" http://www.clerus.org/bibliaclerusonline/it/eki.htm#q) lit.: "O alas, be silent no more! Shout with a hundred thousand tongues. I see that, through silence, the world is broken, the Bride of Christ is impaled"

World, Silence

“The law of giving and receiving is simply this: In a universe where the most absolute truth is that of oneness, you can not ever take, without taking from yourself. And you cannot give without giving to yourself. That is why those who give, get back and those who take, are taken from.”

Teal Swan (1984) American spiritual teacher

Source: tealswan.com/quotes

Law, Universe

“How would you describe your transition from teenager to adult? The truth is that I barely notice it, I spend all my time between studies and filming, I live between Madrid and Barcelona, I barely have time to think about it, I think I lived more as an adult than as a teenager, but very happy.”

Berta Castañé (2002) Spanish actress and model

¿Cómo describirías tu paso de adolescente a adulta? La verdad es que apenas me estoy dando cuenta, paso todo el tiempo entre los estudios y los rodajes, viviendo entre Madrid y Barcelona, casi no tengo tiempo de pensar en ello, creo que llevo más vida de adulta que de adolescente, pero muy feliz. From the interview Hablamos con Berta Castañé, la estrella en ascenso de la pequeña pantalla https://www.marie-claire.es/moda/modelos/fotos/entrevista-a-berta-castane-241588061091, marie-claire.es, 28 July 2020.

Study, Time, Happiness, Thinking