Motivational Quotes

Quotations

I often quote myself. It adds spice to my conversation.

- George Bernard Shaw

Best Quotes about Quotations

The habit some writers indulge in of perpetual quotation is one it behooves lovers of good literature to protest against, for it is an insidious habit which in the end must cloud the stream of thought, or at least check spontaneity. If it be true that le style c'est l homme, what is likely to happen if l homme is for ever eking out his own personality with that of some other individual?

Smyth, Dame Ethel

I quote others in order to better express myself.

Montaigne, Michel Eyquem De

Immortality. I notice that as soon as writers broach this question they begin to quote. I hate quotation. Tell me what you know.

Ralph Waldo Emerson

Our best thoughts come from others.

Emerson, Ralph Waldo

A fine quotation is a diamond in the hand of a man of wit and a pebble in the hand of a fool.

Roux, Joseph

Now we sit through Shakespeare in order to recognize the quotations.

Orson Welles

In the dying world I come from quotation is a national vice. It used to be the classics, now it's lyric verse.

Waugh, Evelyn

Stronger than an army is a quotation whose time has come.

Gates, W. I. E.

Fidelity to the subject's thought and to his characteristic way of expressing himself is the sine qua non of journalistic quotation.

Malcolm, Janet

10.

He wrapped himself in quotations -- as a beggar would enfold himself in the purple of Emperors.

Kipling, Rudyard

11.

I not only use all the brains I have but all I can borrow.

Wilson, Woodrow T.

12.

Some for renown, on scraps of learning dote, And think they grow immortal as they quote.

Edward Young

13.

A short saying oft contains much wisdom.

Sophocles

14.

A thought is often original, though you have uttered it a hundred times.

Oliver Wendell Holmes

15.

It is a good thing for an uneducated man to read books of quotations. Bartlett's Familiar Quotations is an admirable work, and I studied it intently. The quotations when engraved upon the memory give you good thoughts. They also make you anxious to read the authors and look for more.

Sir Winston Churchill

16.

What a good thing Adam had. When he said a good thing he knew nobody had said it before.

Mark Twain

17.

There is not less wit nor less invention in applying rightly a thought one finds in a book, than in being the first author of that thought.

Pierre Bayle

18.

To be amused by what you read--that is the great spring of happy quotations.

C. E. Montague

19.

The wisdom of the wise, and the experience of ages, may be preserved by quotation.

Benjamin Disraeli

20.

I am reminded of the professor who, in his declining hours, was asked by his devoted pupils for his final counsel. He replied,'Verify your quotations.'

Sir Winston Churchill

21.

I must claim the quoter's privilege of giving only as much of the text as will suit my purpose, said Tan-Chun. If I told you how it went on, I should end up by contradicting myself!

Cao Xueqin

22.

The wisdom of the wise and the experience of the ages is preserved into perpetuity by a nation's proverbs, fables, folk sayings and quotations.

William Feather

23.

I didn't really say everything I said.

Yogi Berra

24.

Have you ever observed that we pay much more attention to a wise passage when it is quoted than when we read it in the original author?

Philip G. Hamerton

25.

Quotations offer one kind of break in what the eye can see, the ear can hear.

Hassan, Ihab

26.

If you have any doubts that we live in a society controlled by men, try reading down the index of contributors to a volume of quotations, looking for women's names.

Elaine Gill

27.

Misquotations are the only quotations that are never misquoted.

Hesketh Pearson

28.

An epigram often flashes light into regions where reason shines but dimly.

Edwin P. Whipple

29.

A quotation, like a pun, should come unsought, and then be welcomed only for some propriety of felicity justifying the intrusion.

Robert Chapman

30.

I shall never be ashamed of citing a bad author if the line is good.

Seneca

31.

The surest way to make a monkey of a man is to quote him.

Robert Benchley

32.

The next best thing to saying a good thing yourself, is to quote one.

Emerson, Ralph Waldo

33.

We rarely quote nowadays to appeal to authority... though we quote sometimes to display our sapience and erudition. Some authors we quote against. Some we quote not at all, offering them our scrupulous avoidance, and so make them part of our white mythology. Other authors we constantly invoke, chanting their names in cerebral rituals of propitiation or ancestor worship.

Hassan, Ihab

34.

He wrapped himself in quotations- as a beggar would enfold himself in the purple of Emperors.

Rudyard Kipling

35.

I think we must quote whenever we feel that the allusion is interesting or helpful or amusing.

Fadiman, Clifton

36.

Quotation, n: The act of repeating erroneously the words of another.

Ambrose Bierce

37.

I pick my favorite quotation and store them in my mind as ready armor, offensive or defensive, amid the struggle of this turbulent existence.

Burns, Robert

38.

Quotations in my work are like wayside robbers who leap out armed and relieve the stroller of his conviction.

Benjamin, Walter

39.

That is the point of quotations. One can use another's words to be insulting.

Cross, Amanda

40.

Next to being witty yourself, the best thing is being able to quote another's wit.

Bovee, Christian Nevell

41.

Next to the originator of a good sentence is the first quoter of it.

Ralph Waldo Emerson

42.

I love quotations because it is a joy to find thoughts one might have, beautifully expressed with much authority by someone recognized wiser than oneself.

Marlene Dietrich

43.

I have suffered a great deal from writers who have quoted this or that sentence of mine either out of its context or in juxtaposition to some incongruous matter which quite distorted my meaning , or destroyed it altogether.

Alfred North Whitehead

44.

A book that furnishes no quotations is no book -- it is a plaything.

Peacock, Thomas Love

45.

What's the use of a good quotation if you can't change it?

Doctor Who

46.

The essence of a quote is the compression of a mass of thought and observation into a single saying.

Morely, John

47.

Every quotation contributes something to the stability or enlargement of the language.

Samuel Johnson

48.

He presents me with what is always an acceptable gift who brings me news of a great thought before unknown. He enriches me without impoverishing himself.

Emerson, Ralph Waldo

49.

A book of quotations . . . can never be complete.

Robert M. Hamilton

50.

When a thing has been said and well, have no scruple. Take it and copy it.

Anatole France