Quotes by famous people, credited to who said them. Your own quotes must not match any of these. More are added all the time. 1,161,747 quotes Who coined it · How we decide
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Said in the 1900s
“There are great numbers of people to whom the act of reading a book — any sort of book — is wondrous; they speak of the reader in the tone of warm approbation which they use otherwise when referring to pregnant women, or the newly dead.”
Robertson Davies (1913–1995) said by 1995 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“It is not unknown for people coming to my house to be told by the taxi-driver that there is no charge. It is an unintended and unsought testimonial, but I would be surprised if that I feel is not what the mass of my fellow countrymen feel. I don't feel separate just because I was a professor of Greek. My countrymen say: "this man sees what we see, he feels as we feel, he's one of us, thank God.”
Enoch Powell (1912–1998) first seen 1982 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Interview with The Daily Mail (13 April 1982), quoted in Simon Heffer, Like the Roman: The Life of Enoch Powell (1998), p. 855
“Anatomy is not destiny, but it is not irrelevant either.”
Carl Sagan (1934–1996) said by 1996 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I believe in God. When everything collapses, we grip the last hold, we look from the secure haven how the godless society of the old, holy Europe falls apart. May the game begin.”
Joseph Goebbels (1897–1945) said by 1945 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“In other periods of depression it has always been possible to see some things which were solid and upon which you could base hope, but as I look about, I now see nothing to give ground for hope — nothing of man. But there is still religion, which is the same yesterday, today, and forever. That continues as a solid basis for hope and courage.”
Calvin Coolidge (1872–1933) first seen 1933 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Conversation with Charles Andrews (1 January 1933), quoted in Coolidge: An American Enigma (2000).
“It was only natural for Yozo to vacillate when asked about the reason behind his suicide – it was everything to him.”
Osamu Dazai (1909–1948) said by 1948 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Conflict in free states is the law of life.”
Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, 3rd Marquess of Salisbury (1830–1903) first seen 1865 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: 'The Church in her Relations to Political Parties', Quarterly Review, vol. 118 (July & October 1865), p. 198
“But since he has decided to have the impossibility of living, every misfortune is an opportunity which lays this importance of living before his eyes and obliges him to decide, once again, to die.”
Jean-Paul Sartre (1905–1980) said by 1980 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I abide by a rule concerning reviews: I will never ask, neither in writing nor in person, that a word be put in about my book.... One feels cleaner this way. When someone asks that his book be reviewed he risks running up against a vulgarity offensive to authorial sensibilities.”
Anton Chekhov (1860–1904) first seen 1893 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Letter to N.M. Ezhov (March 22, 1893)
“We have undertaken a new order of things; yet we progress to it under the framework and in the spirit and intent of the American Constitution. We have proceeded throughout the Nation a measurable distance on the road toward this new order.”
Franklin D. Roosevelt (1882–1945) said by 1945 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“If they attack, we shall fight to the end. If the rockets had remained, we would have used them all and directed them against the very heart of the United States, including New York, in our defense against aggression. But we haven't got them, so we shall fight with what we've got.”
Che Guevara (1928–1967) first seen 1962 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Statement in an interview with a reporter for the London Daily Worker (November 1962), as quoted in Companero: The Life and Death of Che Guevara (1998), by Jorge G. Castaneda, p. 231, 1st Vintage Books
“We do not completely love those at whom we cannot smile. There is something inhuman in absolute perfection which overwhelms the mind and heart, which commands respect, but keeps friendship at a distance through discouragement and humiliation. We are always glad when a great man reassures us of his humanity by possessing a few peculiarities.”
André Maurois (1885–1967) said by 1967 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I don't think my writing is sentimental, although it is a very sentimental thing to be a human being.”
William Saroyan (1908–1981) said by 1981 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: As quoted in "Saroyan's Literary Quarantine" by Peter H. King, in The Los Angeles Times (26 March 1997).
“When I had the dividing reason, I shrank from many things; after I had lost it in sight, I hunted through the world for the ugly and the repellent, but I could no longer find them.”
Sri Aurobindo (1872–1950) said by 1950 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The invention of typography confirmed and extended the new visual stress of applied knowledge, providing the first uniformly repeatable “commodity,” the first assembly-line, and the first mass-production. (p. 142)”
Marshall McLuhan (1911–1980) said by 1980 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“What I will be remembered for are the Foundation Trilogy and the Three Laws of Robotics. What I want to be remembered for is no one book, or no dozen books. Any single thing I have written can be paralleled or even surpassed by something someone else has done. However, my total corpus for quantity, quality and variety can be duplicated by no one else. That is what I want to be remembered for.”
Isaac Asimov (1920–1992) first seen 1973 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Yours, Isaac Asimov (20 September 1973)
“Most sermons sound to me like commercials — but I can't make out whether God is the Sponsor or the Product.”
Mignon McLaughlin (1913–1983) said by 1983 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“It appears dubious whether a field theory can account for the atomistic structure of matter and radiation as well as of quantum phenomena.”
Albert Einstein (1879–1955) first seen 1955 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: (1955) as quoted in Some strangeness in the proportion: a centennial symposium to celebrate the achievements of Albert Einstein (1980) Addison-Wesley Pub. Co., Advanced Book Program.
“We are a multitude of selves, and the sooner we learn that, the better. And in that rich alliance of psychological Aspects lies the very secret of our practical operative stability. Only because we change our positions constantly in reference to the psyche and the world are we able to manipulate physically and translate inner experience into sense terms.”
Jane Roberts (1929–1984) said by 1984 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Let us be true to our ideals, true to the spirit of Universal Compassion—whether we walk with the lone worm wandering in the twilight of consciousness, the feathered forms of the fields and forests, the kine of the meadows, the simple savage on the banks of the gladed river, the political blanks whom men call wives, or the outcasts of human industry.”
J. Howard Moore (1862–1916) said by 1916 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Farewell has a sweet sound of reluctance. Good-by is short and final, a word with teeth sharp to bite through the string that ties past to the future.”
John Steinbeck (1902–1968) said by 1968 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“There are no perfectly honorable men; but every true man has one main point of honor and a few minor ones.”
George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950) said by 1950 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The Godhead is broken like bread. We are the pieces.”
W. H. Auden (1907–1973) said by 1973 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The study of science, dissociated from that of philosophy and literature, narrows the mind and weakens the power to love and follow the noblest ideals: for the truths which science ignores and must ignore are precisely those which have the deepest bearing on life and conduct.”
John Lancaster Spalding (1840–1916) said by 1916 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source