Quotes about teapot

A collection of quotes on the topic of teapot, tea, cup.

Quotes about teapot

Bruce Lee photo
Bruce Lee photo
Bertrand Russell photo

“If I were to suggest that between the Earth and Mars there is a china teapot revolving about the sun in an elliptical orbit, nobody would be able to disprove my assertion provided I were careful to add that the teapot is too small to be revealed even by our most powerful telescopes.”

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

"Is There a God?" http://www.personal.kent.edu/~rmuhamma/Philosophy/RBwritings/isThereGod.htm (1952), commissioned by Illustrated Magazine but not published until its appearance in The Collected Papers of Bertrand Russell, Volume 11: Last Philosophical Testament, 1943-68, ed. John G. Slater and Peter Köllner (London: Routledge, 1997), pp. 543-48
1950s
Context: Many orthodox people speak as though it were the business of sceptics to disprove received dogmas rather than of dogmatists to prove them. This is, of course, a mistake. If I were to suggest that between the Earth and Mars there is a china teapot revolving about the sun in an elliptical orbit, nobody would be able to disprove my assertion provided I were careful to add that the teapot is too small to be revealed even by our most powerful telescopes. But if I were to go on to say that, since my assertion cannot be disproved, it is intolerable presumption on the part of human reason to doubt it, I should rightly be thought to be talking nonsense. If, however, the existence of such a teapot were affirmed in ancient books, taught as the sacred truth every Sunday, and instilled into the minds of children at school, hesitation to believe in its existence would become a mark of eccentricity and entitle the doubter to the attentions of the psychiatrist in an enlightened age or of the Inquisitor in an earlier time.

Sophie Kinsella photo
Thich Nhat Hanh photo

“I clean this teapot with the kind of attention I would have were I giving the baby Buddha or Jesus a bath.”

Thich Nhat Hanh (1926) Religious leader and peace activist

Source: The Miracle of Mindfulness: An Introduction to the Practice of Meditation

Gerald Durrell photo
Nick Hornby photo

“He's at the chocolate teapot end of the competency scale.”

Source: A Long Way Down

Derren Brown photo
Brigham Young photo

“Now, there is no harm in a teapot, even if it contains tea, if it is let alone.”

Brigham Young (1801–1877) Latter Day Saint movement leader

Journal of Discourses, 12:28 (April 7, 1867)
Young discusses the Mormon prohibition against drinking coffee and tea, known as the Word of Wisdom.
1860s

Ben Kowalewicz photo
Richard Dawkins photo

“I tell ya, man, your cat is officially out of control. He really gives new meaning to the term tempest in a teapot.”

Darby Conley (1970) American cartoonist

Daily strip for July 19, 2002
Joe Doman

Thich Nhat Hanh photo

“Jesus a bath. Nothing should be treated more carefully than anything else. In mindfulness, compassion, irritation, mustard green plant, and teapot are all sacred.”

Thich Nhat Hanh (1926) Religious leader and peace activist

Source: The Miracle of Mindfulness: An Introduction to the Practice of Meditation (1999) Page 61