Motivational Quotes

Quotations

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

- Robert Benchley

Best Quotes about Quotations

Misquotation is, in fact, the pride and privilege of the learned. A widely-read man never quotes accurately, for the rather obvious reason that he has read too widely.

Pearson, Hesketh

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

Bovee, Christian Nevell

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

Hassan, Ihab

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

Malcolm, Janet

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

Oliver Wendell Holmes

People will accept your ideas much more readily if you tell them Benjamin Franklin said it first.

David H. Comins

A quotation at the right moment is like bread to the famished.

Talmud, The

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

Kipling, Rudyard

Everything of importance has been said before by somebody who did not discover it.

Alfred North Whitehead

10.

Famous remarks are very seldom quoted correctly.

Simeon Strunsky

11.

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

Edward Young

12.

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

Samuel Johnson

13.

Most people are other people. Their thoughts are someone else's opinions, their lives a mimicry, their passions a quotation.

Oscar Wilde

14.

I never have found the perfect quote. At best I have been able to find a string of quotations which merely circle the ineffable idea I seek to express.

Caldwell O'Keefe

15.

Our best thoughts come from others.

Emerson, Ralph Waldo

16.

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

17.

In quoting of books, quote such authors as are usually read; others you may read for your own satisfaction, but not name them.

Selden, John

18.

A short saying oft contains much wisdom.

Sophocles

19.

There are two kinds of marriages -- where the husband quotes the wife and where the wife quotes the husband.

Odets, Clifford

20.

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

Morely, John

21.

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

Fadiman, Clifton

22.

I didn't really say everything I said.

Yogi Berra

23.

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

Robert Benchley

24.

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

Rudyard Kipling

25.

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

Robert M. Hamilton

26.

Quotations are useful in periods of ignorance or obscurantist beliefs.

Debord, Guy

27.

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

Benjamin, Walter

28.

Why are not more gems from our great authors scattered over the country? Great books are not in everybody's reach; and though it is better to know them thoroughly than to know them only here and there, yet it is a good work to give a little to those who have not the time nor means to get more.

Coleridge, Samuel Taylor

29.

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

George Bernard Shaw

30.

Misquotation is, in fact, the pride and privilege of the learned. A widely- read man never quotes accurately, for the rather obvious reason that he has read too widely.

Hesketh Pearson

31.

One has to secrete a jelly in which to slip quotations down people's throats --and one always secretes too much jelly.

Woolf, Virginia

32.

What is an epigram? A dwarfish whole, its body brevity, and wit its soul.

Samuel Taylor Coleridge

33.

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

34.

I might repeat to myself slowly and soothingly, a list of quotations beautiful from minds profound - if I can remember any of the damn things.

Dorothy Parker

35.

Be careful -- with quotations, you can damn anything.

Andre Malraux

36.

A quotation in a speech, article or book is like a rifle in the hands of an infantryman. It speaks with authority.

Brendan Francis

37.

Write a wise saying and your name will live forever.

38.

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

Benjamin Disraeli

39.

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

40.

Quotation... A writer expresses himself in words that have been used before because they give his meaning better than he can give it himself, or because they are beautiful or witty, or because he expects them to touch a cord of association in his reader, or because he wishes to show that he is learned and well read. Quotations due to the last motive are invariably ill-advised; the discerning reader detects it and is contemptuous; the undiscerning is perhaps impressed, but even then is at the same time repelled, pretentious quotations being the surest road to tedium.

Fowler, Henry W.

41.

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

Ralph Waldo Emerson

42.

When we would prepare the mind by a forcible appeal, and opening quotation is a symphony precluding on the chords those tones we are about to harmonize.

Disraeli, Benjamin

43.

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

Joseph Roux

44.

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

Cross, Amanda

45.

The American people would not want to know of any misquotes that Dan Quayle may or may not make.

Dan Quayle

46.

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