As a rule, said Holmes, the more bizarre a thing is the less mysterious it proves to be. It is your commonplace, featureless crimes which are really puzzling, just as a commonplace face is the most difficult to identify.

For the one and only time I caught a glimpse of a great heart as well as of a great brain.

It is only goodness which gives extras, and so I say again that we have much to hope from the flowers.

Should I ever marry, Watson, I should hope to inspire my wife with some feeling which would prevent her from being walked off by a housekeeper when my corpse was lying within a few yards of her.

It is a capital mistake to theorize before you have all the evidence. It biases the judgment.

I have mastered the principles of several religions. They have all shocked me by the violence which I should have to do to my reason to accept the dogmas of any one of them.

Nothing clears up a case so much as stating it to another person.