Truth - Quotes

‘Tis strange – but true; for truth is always strange: Stranger than fiction. - Lord G. G. Bryon

’Tis not enough your counsel still be true; Blunt truths more mischief than nice falsehoods do. - Alexander Pope

A lie has speed, but truth has endurance. - Edgar J. Mohn

A speaker of truth has no friends. - African Proverb

A truth that disheartens because it is true is of more value than the most stimulating of falsehoods. - Maurice Maeterlinck

A truth that’s told with bad intent, beats all the lies you can invent.  - William Blake

A wise man always seeks the light of truth and prefers the company of those who know the value of truth to those who trample it under their feet. - Unknown

All great truths are simple in final analysis, and easily understood; if they are not, they are not great truths. - Napoleon Hill

All truths are easy to understand once they are discovered; the point is to discover them. - Galileo Galilei

All truth is not to be told at all times. - Samuel Butler

All truth is platitude and all platitude is truth. - Gore Vidal

Any truth is better than indefinite doubt. - Arthur Conan Doyle

As scarce as truth is, the supply has always been in excess of the demand. - Josh Billings

Be scrupulously truthful even if the truth is inconvenient, for it is more inconvenient when you try to conceal it. - Russell Bertrand 

Children and fools tell the truth. - Unknown

Fraud and falsehood only dread examination. Truth invites it. - Thomas Cooper

From error to error one discovers the entire truth. - Sigmund Freud

Gold is gold, no matter how muddied it becomes. The truth always wins out in the end. - Buddhist Quote

Half a truth is often a great lie. - Benjamin Franklin

Have patience awhile; slanders are not long-lived. Truth is the child of time; ere long she shall appear to vindicate thee. - Immanuel Kant

He who knows nothing is closer to the truth than he whose mind is filled with falsehoods and errors. - Thomas Jeffeson

Hurt me with the Truth but, never comfort me with a Lie. - Unknown

If you add to the truth, you subtract from it. - Unknown

If you shut the door to all errors, truth will be shut out. - Rabindranath Tagore

If you tell the truth you don’t have to remember anything. - Mark Twain

If you want to find out the truth, ask effective questions which are open-ended, concise and non-challenging. - Unknown

If you wish to see the truth then hold no opinions for or against anything. To set up what you like against what you dislike is the disease of the mind. - Zen Master Seng Tsan

In seeking truth you have to get both sides of a story. - Walter Cronkite

In this world of misery, disease, old age, and death, there is no other protection, refuge or help than our own practice of the truth. Others are powerless; as we sow we reap. - Unknown

It is easier to perceive error than to find truth, for the former lies on the surface and is easily seen, while the latter lies in the depth, where few are willing to search for it. - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

It is not telling the truth that is difficult, it is telling the whole truth. - Unknown

It is only when we silent the blaring sounds of our daily existence that we can finally hear the whispers of truth that life reveals to us, as it stands knocking on the doorsteps of our hearts. - K. T. Jong

Lots of times we don’t even tell people the truth of what we really think because we’re afraid to hurt them and we want to save their feelings, whereas it would be better for them if we were just lovingly honest with them. - Unknown

Man has always sacrificed truth to his vanity, comfort and advantage. He lives by make-believe. - William Somerset Maugham

Men stumble over the truth from time to time, but most pick themselves up and hurry off as nothing happened. - Winston Chruchill

Most people don't really want the truth. They just want constant reassurance that what they believe is the truth. - Unknown

Most truths are so naked that people feel sorry for them and cover them up, at least a little bit. - Edward R. Murrow

Never assume the obvious is true. - William Safir

Nine times out of ten, in the arts as in life, there is actually no truth to be discovered; there is only error to be exposed. - H. L. Mencken

No human being is constituted to know the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth; and even the best of men must be content with fragments, with partial glimpses, never the full fruition. - William Osler

No man thoroughly understands a truth until he has contended against it. - Ralph Waldo Emerson

No one owns the truth, no person, no prophet, and no holy book. Each of those and, indeed, each person has the ability, the right, and the responsibility to seek and find his or her own truth, and, if found, it may be a truth for that moment, in that situation, and for that person only. - Unknown

Nobody speaks the truth when there is something they must have. - Elizabeth Bowen

On the mountains of truth you can never climb in vain: either you will reach a point higher up today, or you will be training your powers so that you will be able to climb higher tomorrow. - Friedrich Nietzsche

Once a profound truth has been seen, it cannot be ‘unseen’. - David Victor Sim

People can’t change truth, but the truth can change people. - Unknown 

Piety requires us to honour truth above our friends. - Aristotle

Possessed by ideas of the past, preoccupied with images of the future, the mind overlooks the plain truth of the moment. - Lao Tzu

Prudent is he who can keep silent that part of truth which may be untimely, and by not speaking it, does not spoil the truth of what he said. - Unknown

Revealed truth cannot belong to a different order from all other truth that appeals to the human consciousness. On the contrary, by universal admission the teaching of revelation finds its best and only sufficient evidence in the consciousness of the believer. - Unknown

Say not unto thyself, Behold, truth breedeth hatred, and I will avoid it; dissimulation raiseth friends, and I will follow it. Are not the enemies made by truth, better than the friends obtained by flattery? - Akhnaton

Seek not greatness, but seek truth and you will find both. - Horace Mann

Some people do not mind the lies told about them. It is the truth that bothers them. - Unknown

Sometimes people don't want to hear the truth because they don't want their illusions destroyed.  - Friedrich Nietzsche

Telling the truth is like taking herbs in lieu of drugs. It does not taste well or cure fast, but it works better in the long term and gives fewer side effects to the patient. - Unknown

The discovery of truth is prevented more effectively, not by the false appearance things present and which mislead into error, not directly by weakness of the reasoning powers, but by preconceived opinion, by prejudice. - Arthur Schopenhauer

The dissection of the false will never reveal Truth. - Unknown

The dwelling place of truth is in the inner man. And if you discover your own nature as subject to change, then go beyond that nature. Press on toward the source from which the light of reason itself is kindled. - Unknown

The inquiry of Truth, which is the love-making, or wooing of it, the knowledge of Truth, which is the presence of it, and the belief of Truth which is the enjoying of it, is the sovereign good of human nature. - Francis Bacon

The least initial deviation from the truth is multiplied later a thousand fold. - Aristotle

The naked truth is always better than the best dressed lie. - Unknown

The search for truth is, as it always has been, the noblest expression of the human spirit. Man’s insatiable desire for knowledge about himself, about his environment and the forces by which he is surrounded, gives life its meaning and purpose, and clothes it with final dignity.... And yet we know, deep in our hearts, that knowledge is not enough.... Unless we can anchor our knowledge to moral purposes, the ultimate result will be dust and ashes – dust and ashes that will bury the hopes and monuments of men beyond recovery. - Raymond B. Fosdick

The truth always turns out to be simpler than you thought. - Richard Feynman

The truth is incontrovertible. Malice may attack it. Ignorance may deride it. But in the end, there it is. - Winston Churchill

The truth is like a lion. You don’t have to defend it. Let it loose. It will defend it self. - St. Augustine

The truth is more important than the facts. - Frank Lloyd Wright

The truth is often a terrible weapon of aggression. It is possible to lie, and even to murder, with the truth. - Alfred Adler

The truth is rarely pure and never simple. - Oscar Wilde

The truth may be puzzling. It may be counter intuitive. It may contradict deeply held prejudices. It may not be consistent with what we desperately want to be true. But our preferences do not determine what’s true. - Carl Sagan

The truth that is suppressed by friends is the readiest weapon of the enemy. - Robert Louis Stevenson

The truth that makes men free is for the most part the truth which men prefer not to hear. - Herbert Sebastian Agar

The truth that survives is simply the lie that is pleasantest to believe. - H. L. Mencken

The Truth told with bad intent beats all the lies you can invent. - William Blake

The truth waits for anyone who wishes to find it. - Unknown

The truth will set you free, but first it will make you miserable. - James A. Garfield

The words of truth are always paradoxical. - Lao Tzu

There are many truths of which the full meaning cannot be realized until personal experience has brought it home. - John Stuart Mill

There are only two mistakes one can make along the road to truth; not going all the way, and not starting. - The Buddha

There are very few human beings who receive the truth, complete and staggering, by instant illumination. Most of them acquire it fragment by fragment, on a small scale, by successive developments, cellularly, like a laborious mosaic. - Anais Nin

There is a basic truth in everyone we meet. Look closely and listen well, and the true meaning of a fellowman will be revealed. - Unknown

There is no truth existing which I fear, or would wish unknown to the whole world. - Thomas Jeffeson

There is Truth to be found out there, but the search is best done through doubt rather than conviction. - Unknown 

To attempt seeing Truth without knowing Falsehood. It is the attempt to see the Light without knowing the Darkness. It cannot be. - Frank Herbert

Too much truth is uncouth. - Franklin P. Adams 

Truth is a demure lady, much too lady-like to knock you on the head and drag you to her cave. She is there, but the people must want her, and seek her out. - Unknown

Truth is a torch but a tremendous one. That is why we hurry past it, shielding our eyes, indeed, in fear of getting burned. - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Truth is always hidden like a shadow in darkness. - Unknown

Truth is as impossible to be soiled by any outward touch as the sunbeam. - Unknown

Truth is both the way and the goal, the direction to the destination and the destination itself. - Unknown

Truth is generally the best vindication against slander. - Abraham Lincoln

Truth is like a corrosive that will eat its way into the hardest of stone. - Unknown

Truth is like the stars; it does not appear except from behind obscurity of the night. Truth is like all beautiful things in the world; it does not disclose its desirability except to those who first feel the influence of falsehood. Truth is a deep kindness that teaches us to be content in our everyday life and share with the people the same happiness. - Kahlil Gibran

Truth is like the sun. You can shut it out for a time, but it ain’t goin’ away. - Elvis Presley

Truth is not only violated by falsehood; it may be outraged by silence. - Henri Frederic Amiel

Truth is stranger than fiction, but it is because Fiction is obliged to stick to possibilities; Truth isn’t. - Mark Twain

Truth is the property of no individual but is the treasure of all men. - Ralph Waldo Emerson

Truth is the secret of eloquence and of virtue, the basis of moral authority: it is the highest summit of art and of life. - Henri Frederic Amiel

Truth is tough. It will not break, like a bubble, at a touch; nay, you may kick it about all day, like a football, and it will be round and full at evening. - Oliver Wendell Holmes

Truth lies within a little and certain compass, but error is immense. - Bolingbroke

Truth may be stretched, but cannot be broken, and always gets above falsehood, as oil does above water. - Miguel de Cervantes

Truth never yet fell dead in the streets; it has such affinity with the soul of man, the seed however broadcast will catch somewhere and produce its hundredfold. - Theodore Parker

Truth often suffers more by the heat of its defenders than from the arguments of its opposers. - William Penn

Truth or tact? You have to choose. Most times they are not compatible. - Eddie Cantor

Truth sits upon the lips of dying men. - Matthew Arnold

Truth uttered before its time is always dangerous. - Mencius 

Truth will always be truth, regardless of lack of understanding, disbelief or ignorance. - W. Clement Stone

Truth will lose its credit, if delivered by a person that has none. - Bishop Robert South

Truth, like gold, is to be obtained not by its growth, but by washing away from it all that is not gold. - Leo Tolstoy 

Truth, when witty, is the wittiest of all things. - Augustus Hare

We all seek to know the truth about everything around us except ourselves; because it hurts to know about one’s own limitations and to admit them. - Unknown

We hold these truths to be sacred and undeniable; that all men are created equal and independent, that from that equal creation they derive fights inherent and inalienable, among which are the preservation of life and liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. - Thomas Jeffeson

When distant and unfamiliar and complex things are communicated to great masses of people, the truth suffers a considerable and often a radical distortion. The complex is made over into the simple, the hypothetical into the dogmatic, and the relative into an absolute. - Walter Lippmann

When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains however improbable, must be the truth. - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

While we are examining into everything we sometimes find truth where we least expected it. - Marcus Fabius Quintilian