Quotes about reason
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“You make a good point,' Fletcher conceded. 'See, there's a reason why you're the girl and I'm the boy. You think about things while I…'
'Don't?'
'Exactly,' he said happily.”

Derek Landy (1974) Irish children's writer

Source: Death Bringer

Girl, Boy, Thinking

“There is a timbre of voice
that comes from not being heard
and knowing / you are not being
heard / noticed only
by others / not heard
for the same reason.”

Audre Lorde (1934–1992) writer and activist

Source: The Collected Poems

“I am hopeful, though not full of hope, and the only reason I don't believe in happy endings is because I don't believe in endings.”

Edward Abbey (1927–1989) American author and essayist

Source: Postcards from Ed: Dispatches and Salvos from an American Iconoclast

Hope, Happiness

“I guess we are who we are for a lot of reasons. And maybe we'll never know most of them. But even if we don't have the power to choose where we come from, we can still choose where we go from there.”

Stephen Chbosky book The Perks of Being a Wallflower

Source: The Perks of Being a Wallflower

“There is one other reason for dressing well, namely that dogs respect it, and will not attack you in good clothes.”

Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882) American philosopher, essayist, and poet

Dogs, Clothes

“Rationalization may be defined as self-deception by reasoning.”

Karen Horney book Our Inner Conflicts

Our Inner Conflicts (1945) http://encarta.msn.com/quote_561555562/Reason_Rationalization_may_be_defined_as.html

“Roark smiled, "Gail, if this boat were sinking, I'd give my life to save you. Not because it's any kind of duty. Only because I like you, for reasons and standards of my own. I could die for you. But I couldn't and wouldn't live for you.”

Ayn Rand book The Fountainhead

Source: The Fountainhead

Life, Smile

“When a sense of dissatisfaction persists, that means it was placed there by God for one reason only: you need to change everything and move forward.”

Paulo Coelho book Aleph

Source: Aleph

God, Sense, Change

“The fact that the market is not doing what we wish it would do is no reason to automatically assume that the government would do better.”

Thomas Sowell (1930) American economist, social theorist, political philosopher and author

“In Will's experience, when someone who ought to be afraid wasn't, the reason was rarely bravery. Usually it meant that they knew something you didn't.”

Cassandra Clare book Clockwork Angel

Source: Clockwork Angel

“The solution of the problem of life is life itself. Life is not attained by reason and analysis but first of all by living.”

Thomas Merton (1915–1968) Priest and author

Life, Problem

“It is in the knowledge of the genuine conditions of our lives that we must draw our strength to live and our reasons for living.”

Simone de Beauvoir book The Ethics of Ambiguity

Part I : Ambiguity and Freedom
The Ethics of Ambiguity (1947)
Variant: Let us try to assume our fundamental ambiguity. It is in the knowledge of the genuine conditions of our life that we must draw our strength to live and our reason for acting
Context: In spite of so many stubborn lies, at every moment, at every opportunity, the truth comes to light, the truth of life and death, of my solitude and my bond with the world, of my freedom and my servitude, of the insignificance and the sovereign importance of each man and all men. There was Stalingrad and there was Buchenwald, and neither of the two wipes out the other. Since we do not succeed in fleeing it, let us therefore try to look the truth in the face. Let us try to assume our fundamental ambiguity. It is in the knowledge of the genuine conditions of our life that we must draw our strength to live and our reason for acting [C'est dans la connaissance des conditions authentiques de notre vie qu'il nous faut puiser la force de vivre et des raisons d'agir].

Knowledge, Drawing

“Imagination without reason produces impossible monsters; with reason, it becomes the mother of the arts, and the source of its marvels.”

Francisco De Goya (1746–1828) Spanish painter and printmaker (1746–1828)

quoted by Albert Frederick Calvert, in Goya; an account of his life and works; publisher London J. Lane, 1908; as quoted in Francisco Goya, Hugh Stokes, Herbert Jenkins Limited Publishers, London, 1914, pp. 355-377
Goya wrote this inscription upon a later copy of the etching-plate Capricho no. 43
1790s

Art, Imagination

““You can prove anything you want by coldly logical reason—if you pick the proper postulates. We have ours and Cutie has his.”
“Then let’s get at those postulates in a hurry. The storm’s due tomorrow.”
Powell sighed wearily. “That’s where everything falls down. Postulates are based on assumptions and adhered to by faith. Nothing in the Universe can shake them. I’m going to bed.””

Isaac Asimov book I, Robot

Source: I, Robot (1950), “Reason”, p. 63

Faith, Universe

“The reason Victorian society was so restricted and repressed was that it was impossible to move without knocking something over.”

Connie Willis book To Say Nothing of the Dog

Source: To Say Nothing of the Dog

“… what you learn today, for no reason at all, will help you discover all the wonderful secrets of tomorrow.”

Norton Juster book The Phantom Tollbooth

Variant: What you learn today, for no reason at all, will help you discover all the wonderful secrets of tomorrow.
Source: The Phantom Tollbooth

Secret, Learning, Help

“I am the inferior of any man whose rights I trample under foot. Men are not superior by reason of the accidents of race or color. They are superior who have the best heart — the best brain.”

Robert G. Ingersoll (1833–1899) Union United States Army officer

Liberty.
Source: The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll, Vol. IX

Men, Color, Heart

“I'm telling you this for one reason and one reason only: No matter how sure you are of someone's love, it's always nice to hear it.”

Mike Gayle book Turning Thirty

Source: Turning Thirty

Love

“Reason is, and ought only to be the slave of the passions.”

David Hume (1711–1776) Scottish philosopher, economist, and historian

Passion

“It was a kiss made in lonely dreams. A kiss that took its time. A kiss that felt so right she couldn't remember all the reasons it was wrong.”

Susan Elizabeth Phillips (1948) American writer

Source: This Heart of Mine

Dreams, Kiss, Time

“Thinking only begins at the point where we have come to know that Reason, glorified for centuries, is the most obstinate adversary of thinking.”

Martin Heidegger (1889–1976) German philosopher

Thinking

“Trying to reason with an addict was like trying to blow out a lightbulb.”

Anne Lamott (1954) Novelist, essayist, memoirist, activist

“The ghost of a smile flickered across his lips. ‘You’re always the voice of reason. Just try listening to yourself once in a while.”

Richelle Mead (1976) American writer

Smile

“Being polite is not only the right way to respond to people but also the easiest. Life is so filled with unavoidable conflict that I see no reason to promote more confrontations.”

Dean Koontz Odd Thomas

Source: Odd Thomas

Life, People, Way

“But my agent has a theory. She says every marriage is jerry-rigged. Even the ones that look reasonable from the outside are held together inside with chewing gum and wire and string.”

Jenny Offill book Dept. of Speculation

Source: Dept. of Speculation

Marriage

“Seeing that a Pilot steers the ship in which we sail, who will never allow us to perish even in the midst of shipwrecks, there is no reason why our minds should be overwhelmed with fear and overcome with weariness.”

John Calvin (1509–1564) French Protestant reformer

Fear

“It is not theft, properly speaking, to take secretly and use another's property in a case of extreme need: because that which he takes for the support of his life becomes his own property by reason of that need”

Thomas Aquinas (1225–1274) Italian Dominican scholastic philosopher of the Roman Catholic Church

Life, Support

“I think the main reason my marriages failed is that I always loved too well but never wisely.”

Ava Gardner (1922–1990) American actress

Love, Marriage, Thinking

“Reason is immortal, all else mortal.”

Pythagoras (-585–-495 BC) ancient Greek mathematician and philosopher

As quoted in Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers, Sect. 30, as translated by Robert Drew Hicks (1925); also in The Demon and the Quantum: From the Pythagorean Mystics to Maxwell's Demon (2007) by Robert J. Scully, Marlan O. Scully, p. 11

“I must Create a System, or be enslav'd by another Man's;
I will not Reason and Compare: my business is to Create.”

William Blake book Jerusalem: The Emanation of the Giant Albion

Source: 1800s, Jerusalem The Emanation of The Giant Albion (c. 1803–1820), Ch. 1, plate 10, lines 20-21 The Words of Los

Business

“And all people live, not by reason of any care they have for themselves, but by the love for them that is in other people.”

Leo Tolstoy (1828–1910) Russian writer

Love, People

“The animals of the world exist for their own reasons. They were not made for humans any more than black people were made for whites or women for men.”

Alice Walker (1944) American author and activist

Foreword to The Dreaded Comparison: Animal Slavery and Human Slavery (1996) by Marjorie Spiegel, p. 14 http://books.google.com/books?ei=je4zTPjrBcmTnQfXmMCLBA&ct=result&id=8u_tAAAAMAAJ&dq=dreaded+comparison+%22exist+for+their+own%22&q=%22exist+for+their+own%22.

Women, Men, People, World

“Age is just a number, not a state of mind or a reason for any type of particular behaviour.”

Cecelia Ahern book Love, Rosie

Source: Love, Rosie

Age

“If you have reasons for not coming back, I don’t want to know them. I just want you to come back anyway. Ignorance, see?”

Jodi Lynn Anderson American children's writer

Variant: If you have reasons for not coming back, I don't want to know them. I just want you to come back anyway
Source: Tiger Lily

“The only reason I don't throw myself into your arms, kiss you and make love with you now is that I lack the courage and am afraid of loving you.”

Paulo Coelho book Aleph

Source: Aleph

Love, Making love, Courage, Kiss

“I try to have reasonably happy endings because I would hate any child to be cast down in gloom and despair; I want to show them you can find a way out of it.”

Jacqueline Wilson (1945) novelist

Hate, Way, Despair, Happiness

“I guess the real reason that my wife and I had children is the same reason that Napoleon had for invading Russia: it seemed like a good idea at the time.”

Bill Cosby (1937) American actor, comedian, author, producer, musician, activist

Children, Idea, Time

“there is no reason to constantly attempt to figure everything out.”

Michael Singer (1945) American landscape architect

Source: The Untethered Soul: The Journey Beyond Yourself

“There are all kinds of mix tapes. there is always a reason to make one.”

Rob Sheffield (1966) American music journalist

Source: Love Is a Mix Tape

“Why should I even bother? What's the point, really?"
He thought for a moment. "Who says there has to be a point?" he asked. "Or a reason. Maybe it's just something you have to do.”

Sarah Dessen book Along for the Ride

Source: Along for the Ride

“If God wanted us to act on instinct, we wouldn't have the power of reason.”

Jodi Picoult (1966) Author

Source: Mercy

God

“Satisfy your demand for reason but always remember that charity is beyond reason, and God can be known through charity.”

Flannery O’Connor (1925–1964) American novelist, short story writer

Source: The Habit of Being: Letters of Flannery O'Connor

God

“Their reasons don't mean anything unless I have a choice.”

Scott Westerfeld book Pretties

Source: Pretties

“I wonder if the reason I tend to say yes to everything is because I deeply believe that I can survive anything.”

Scarlett Thomas book The End of Mr. Y

Source: The End of Mr. Y

“To say that I am made in the image of God is to say that Love is the reason for my existence, for God is love.
Love is my true identity. Selflessness is my true self. Love is my true character. Love is my name.”

Thomas Merton (1915–1968) Priest and author

Seeds of Contemplation (1949).

Love, God

“The very reason I write is so that I might not sleepwalk through my entire life.”

Zadie Smith (1975) British writer

Life

“That was all he said, except for "Aaaeerrgghhh." Which is not really a word. But the reason that he screamed "Aaaeerrgghhh" was that Franco had bitten him savegly on the wrist.”

Eoin Colfer book The Wish List

Source: The Wish List

“Looks are deceiving," Risa says. "After all, when I first saw you I thought you looked reasonably intelligent.”

Neal Shusterman book Unwind

Variant: Do I look feeble to you"
"Actually, yes."
"Well, looks can be deceiving. For instance, when I met you, I thought you look reasonably intelligent.
Source: Unwind

Intelligence

“Internet porn makes everything more reasonable -- once you've realized there is a massive subculture of upwardly mobile people who think it's erotic to see an Asian woman giving a hand job to a javelina, nothing else in the world seems crazy.”

Chuck Klosterman (1972) Author, Columnist

People, World, Thinking

“Were we incapable of empathy – of putting ourselves in the position of others and seeing that their suffering is like our own – then ethical reasoning would lead nowhere. If emotion without reason is blind, then reason without emotion is impotent.”

Peter Singer (1946) Australian philosopher

Source: Writings on an Ethical Life

Suffering

“They don't hang dukes, darling. He'd be let off by reason of insanity. Everyone knows the upper classes are batty.”

Rhys Bowen (1941) British writer of children's picture books, YA novels, and (as Rhys Bowen) mystery novels

Source: Her Royal Spyness

“Even in the worst tragedies and crisis, there’s no reason to add to everyone’s misery by looking miserable yourself.”

Elizabeth Gilbert book Eat, Pray, Love

Source: Eat, Pray, Love

“Hammett gave murder back to the kind of people that commit it for reasons, not just to provide a corpse; and with the means at hand, not hand-wrought dueling pistols, curare and tropical fish.”

Raymond Chandler book The Simple Art of Murder

Source: The Simple Art of Murder

People, Fish

“Every impulse of feeling should be guided by reason; and, in my opinion, exertion should always be in proportion to what is required.”

Jane Austen book Pride and Prejudice

Source: Pride and Prejudice

Feeling

“We cannot reason ourselves out of our basic irrationality. All we can do is learn the art of being irrational in a reasonable way.”

Aldous Huxley book Island

Source: Island

Art, Way, Learning

“If we long to believe that the stars rise and set for us, that we are the reason there is a Universe, does science do us a disservice in deflating our conceits?”

Carl Sagan book The Demon-Haunted World

Source: The Demon-Haunted World : Science as a Candle in the Dark (1995), Ch. 1 : The Most Precious Thing, p. 12
Source: The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark

Star, Universe, Science

“If it is not tempered by compassion, and empathy, reason can lead men and women into a moral void. (95)”

Karen Armstrong (1944) author and comparative religion scholar from Great Britain

Source: Twelve Steps to a Compassionate Life

Women, Men

“Abe shook his head, and now the smile was gone altogether. "That's not the reason either. Don't lie to me little girl."
I felt my hackles going up. "And don't interrogate me, old man.”

Richelle Mead Blood Promise

Source: Blood Promise

Lie, Smile, Girl

“If a man never contradicts himself, the reason must be that he virtually never says anything at all.”

Erwin Schrödinger (1887–1961) Austrian physicist

Source: What Is Life? with Mind and Matter and Autobiographical Sketches

“But pain… seems to me an insufficient reason not to embrace life. Being dead is quite painless. Pain, like time, is going to come on regardless. Question is, what glorious moments can you win from life in addition to the pain?”

Lois McMaster Bujold Vorkosigan Saga

Source: Vorkosigan Saga, Barrayar (1991)

Life, Pain, Question, Time

“I prefer rationalism to atheism. The question of God and other objects-of-faith are outside reason and play no part in rationalism, thus you don't have to waste your time in either attacking or defending.”

Isaac Asimov (1920–1992) American writer and professor of biochemistry at Boston University, known for his works of science fiction …

God, Faith, Question, Time

“If a guy truly likes you, but for personal reasons he needs to take things slow, he will let you know that immediately. He won’t keep you guessing,
because he’ll want to make sure you don’t get frustrated and go away.”

Greg Behrendt (1963) American comedian

Source: He's Just Not That Into You: The No-Excuses Truth to Understanding Guys

Guy, Personality

“Who is Hunter Becker?"
"Becker the Gory? Lighthouse Keepers? Boston?"
"I would've preferred Becker the Easiley Surrendering or Becker the Quite Reasonable, but beyond that his name tells me nothing.”

Ilona Andrews American husband-and-wife novelist duo

Source: Magic Slays

“Hope was an instinct only the reasoning human mind could kill. An animal never knew despair.”

Graham Greene book The Power and the Glory

Source: The Power and the Glory

Hope, Animals, Despair

“This was the reason there was music, he realized. There were some feelings that didn't have words big enough to describe them.”

Jodi Picoult (1966) Author

Variant: This is why there was music. There were some feelings that just didn't have words big enough to describe them.
Source: Between the Lines

Music, Feeling

“There are moments when troubles enter our lives and we can do nothing to avoid them.
But they are there for a reason. Only when we have overcome them will we understand why they were there.”

Paulo Coelho book The Fifth Mountain

Source: The Fifth Mountain

Understanding

“No blame, no
reasoning, no argument, just understanding. If you
understand, and you show that you understand, you can
love, and the situation will change.”

Thich Nhat Hanh (1926) Religious leader and peace activist

Source: Peace Is Every Step: The Path of Mindfulness in Everyday Life

Love, Understanding, Change

“To live is like to love — all reason is against it, and all healthy instinct for it.”

Samuel Butler (1835–1902) novelist

Life and Love
The Note-Books of Samuel Butler (1912), Part XIV - Higgledy-Piggledy

Love

“I need voices of reason and of hysteria and of empathy. I need to have an Alanis moment. I need advice from Elizabeth Bennett. I need Tim Tams and comfort food.”

Melina Marchetta (1965) Australian teen writer

Source: Saving Francesca

Food

“Nowadays I know the true reason I read is to feel less alone, to make a connection with a consciousness other than my own.”

Zadie Smith book Changing My Mind: Occasional Essays

Source: Changing My Mind: Occasional Essays

Feeling, Reading

“She hoped to be wise and reasonable in time; but alas! Alas! She must confess to herself that she was not wise yet.”

Jane Austen book Persuasion

Source: Persuasion

Hope, Time

“Some people will never learn anything, for this reason, because they understand everything too soon.”

Alexander Pope (1688–1744) eighteenth century English poet

Thoughts on Various Subjects (1727)
Source: Miscellanies in Verse and Prose. by Alexander Pope, Esq; And Dean Swift. in One Volume. Viz. the Strange and Deplorable Frensy of Mr. John Dennis. ... Epitaph on Francis Ch-Is. Soldier and Scholar. with Several More Epigrams, Epitaphs, and Poems.

People, Understanding, Learning