Quotes about the truth

page 6

"Sohrab and Rustum" (1853), lines 656-657

Source: Atop an Underwood: Early Stories and Other Writings

Volume III, chapter II, section 99.
The Stones of Venice (1853)
Source: The Stones of Venice: Volume I. The Foundations

Source: Discourse on Method

Source: 1800s, Auguries of Innocence (1803), Line 53

Source: Shantaram

Source: The Vampire Prince

Source: Pensées

Kunst ist Magie, befreit von der Lüge, Wahrheit zu sein.
E. Jephcott, trans. (1974), § 143
Minima Moralia (1951)

Speech at Aylesbury, Royal and Central Bucks Agricultural Association (21 September 1865), cited in Wit and Wisdom of Benjamin Disraeli, Earl of Beaconsfield, Collected from his Writings and Speeches (1881), p. 356
1860s

The Pearl of Orr's Island : A Story of the Coast of Maine (1862).

Source: Pensées

J'accuse! (1898)
Context: These military tribunals have, decidedly, a most singular idea of justice.
This is the plain truth, Mr. President, and it is terrifying. It will leave an indelible stain on your presidency. I realise that you have no power over this case, that you are limited by the Constitution and your entourage. You have, nonetheless, your duty as a man, which you will recognise and fulfill. As for myself, I have not despaired in the least, of the triumph of right. I repeat with the most vehement conviction: truth is on the march, and nothing will stop it. Today is only the beginning, for it is only today that the positions have become clear: on one side, those who are guilty, who do not want the light to shine forth, on the other, those who seek justice and who will give their lives to attain it. I said it before and I repeat it now: when truth is buried underground, it grows and it builds up so much force that the day it explodes it blasts everything with it. We shall see whether we have been setting ourselves up for the most resounding of disasters, yet to come.

"Pirx's Tale" in More Tales of Pirx The Pilot (1983)
Context: Oh, I read good books, too, but only Earthside. Why that is, I don't really know. Never stopped to analyze it. Good books tell the truth, even when they're about things that never have been and never will be. They're truthful in a different way. When they talk about outer space, they make you feel the silence, so unlike the Earthly kind — and the lifelessness. Whatever the adventures, the message is always the same: humans will never feel at home out there.

Source: Going Postal

Misattributed to Lincoln by several authors since about 2000. Source of quote: General Douglas MacArthur is quoted as saying, "Like Abraham Lincoln, I am a firm believer in the people. If given the truth, they can be depended upon to meet any national crisis. The great point is to bring them the real facts" (John Gunther, The Riddle of MacArthur, New York: Harper, 1950, p. 61). By the 1970s, the phrase is quoted in several places without the words "Like Abraham Lincoln," and attributed directly to Lincoln. The additional phrase "and beer" first appears in a list of jokes published online in 1999.
Misattributed

Source: A Big Little Life: A Memoir of a Joyful Dog

Source: The Importance of Being Earnest

Variant: We are willing to believe anything other than the truth.
Source: The Shadow of the Wind

Tom, as Narrator, in Scene One
Source: The Glass Menagerie (1944)

Misattributed

Source: The Second Sex

Source: Orlando

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

Source: A Streetcar Named Desire

Public Address, Blake's Notebook c. 1810
1810s

Source: Antony and Cleopatra

Source: Carpe Jugulum

Source: Rights of Man

Source: The Confessions of Catherine de Medici

Vol. I, ch. 4. Compare: "I should like to see any kind of a man, distinguishable from a gorilla, that some good and even pretty woman could not shape a husband out of", Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr., The Professor at the Breakfast Table; "The whole world is strewn with snares, traps, gins and pitfalls for the capture of men by women", Bernard Shaw, Epistle Dedicatory to Man and Superman.
Source: Vanity Fair (1847–1848)

No. 96 (16 February 1751)
Source: The Rambler (1750–1752)

Source: Children of Dune

Source: Under My Skin: Volume One of My Autobiography, to 1949

Source: The Lightning Thief

Source: Tess of the D'Urbervilles

Source: Existence & the Existent

Letter to Edwin Stanton (14 July 1864); published in Abraham Lincoln: A History (1890) by John Hay
1860s

Source: Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1885), Ch. 1.
Source: The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
Context: You don't know about me without you have read a book by the name of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer; but that ain't no matter. That book was made by Mr. Mark Twain, and he told the truth, mainly. There was things which he stretched, but mainly he told the truth.

Source: Sourcery

Source: Survivor

"The Nature of Philosophy" (p. 6)
Modern Philosophy (1995)
Source: Modern Philosophy: An Introduction and Survey

Source: Telling Christina Goodbye

Source: The Picture of Dorian Gray

Source: Muhammad Ali: His Life and Times

Source: The Long Goodbye

A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/etext03/7cncd10.txt (1849), Wednesday

Cited in Rules for methodizing the Apocalypse, Rule 9, from a manuscript published in The Religion of Isaac Newton (1974) by Frank E. Manuel, p. 120, as quoted in Socinianism And Arminianism : Antitrinitarians, Calvinists, And Cultural Exchange in Seventeenth-Century Europe (2005) by Martin Mulsow, Jan Rohls, p. 273.
As quoted in God in the Equation : How Einstein Transformed Religion (2002) by Corey S. Powell, p. 29
Variant: Truth is ever to be found in the simplicity, and not in the multiplicity and confusion of things.

Source: Pale Fire

Pudd'nhead Wilson's New Calendar, Ch. XV
Misquoted as "Why shouldn’t truth be stranger than fiction? Fiction, after all, has to make sense." by Laurence J. Peter in "Peter’s Quotations: Ideas for Our Time", among many others.
Following the Equator (1897)
Source: Following the Equator: A Journey Around the World

Source: Brida

Source: Ecce Homo

1950s
Context: In matters concerning truth and justice there can be no distinction between big problems and small; for the general principles which determine the conduct of men are indivisible. Whoever is careless with truth in small matters cannot be trusted in important affairs.

(1955) as quoted in Albert Einstein: Historical and Cultural Perspectives (1997) ed. , p. 388, from The Centennial Symposium in Jerusalem (1979)

Source: Himalayan Lust

Source: On Being Ill

Source: Love Comes Softly

Source: Sword of Destiny

Source: A New Earth: Awakening to Your Life's Purpose

Variant: I’ve had enough of someone else’s propaganda… I’m for truth, no matter who tells it. I’m for justice, no matter who it is for or against. I’m a human being first and foremost, and as such I’m for whoever and whatever benefits humanity as a whole.
Source: The Autobiography of Malcolm X
Source: The Autobiography of Malcolm X (1965), p. 400
Context: I've had enough of someone else's propaganda. I'm for truth, no matter who tells it. I'm for justice, no matter who it's for or against. I'm a human being first and foremost, and as such I am for whoever and whatever benefits humanity as a whole.

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

Source: A Streetcar Named Desire

Source: Chasing Fire

Source: The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants

Source: Evermore

Source: A Room of One's Own