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The wise thing is for us diligently to train ourselves to lie thoughtfully, judiciously; to lie with a good object, and not an evil one; to lie for others' advantage, and not our own; to lie healingly, charitably, humanely, not cruelly, hurtfully, maliciously; to lie gracefully and graciously, not awkwardly and clumsily; to lie firmly, frankly, squarely, with head erect, not haltingly, tortuously, with pusillanimous mien, as being ashamed of our high calling.
Mark TwainRace is a lie built on a lie. The first lie is that people are different, somehow skin color or hair texture is more significant than eye color, or the shape of one's feet. The second lie built on top of that is that there's a hierarchy that more significant difference, the color showing up as brown on your skin rather than brown in your hair, or whatever, is somehow more significant and there's some sort of hierarchy. That the lighter you are, the straighter your hair, the better you are.
Benjamin JealousWhy does anyone lie? 'Cause we're scared or crazy, maybe just because we're mean. I guess there's a million reason to lie, and I might've told that many...but none like that. I guess there's always that one lie we never get over. What? Oh, maybe you don't know about it yet. Maybe you never tell a lie so big it can eat away a part of you. But if you ever do...and if you get lucky...you might a chance to set it right. Just one chance to change it. Then it's gone. And it never comes back again.
Billie LettsI've always thought that art is a lie, an interesting lie. And I'll sort of listen to the "lie" and try to imagine the world which makes that lie true...what that world must be like, and what would have to happen for us to get from this world to that one.
Brian EnoBad schools, crime, drugs, high taxes, the social security mess, racism, the health care ? crisis? unemployment, welfare state dependency, illegitimacy, the gap between rich and poor. What do these issues have in common? Politicians, the media, and our so-called leaders lie to us about them. They lie about the cause. They lie about the effect. They lie about the solutions.
Larry ElderTrue love will triumph in the endโwhich may or may not be a lie, but if it is a lie, it's the most beautiful lie we have.
John GreenSuppose whether or not someone tells me a lie depends only on whether he wants to, but he is morally indifferent, he doesn't care much about the truth or about me, and his self interest, which he worships, tells him to lie, and so it comes about that given his psychology, it is a forgone conclusion that he will lie to me. I think in this case he is still blameworthy, and that implies, among other things, that he did something he ought not do.
Nomy ArpalyAmong other common lies, we have the silent lie - the deception which one conveys by simply keeping still and concealing the truth. Many obstinate truth-mongers indulge in this dissipation, imagining that if they speak no lie, they lie not at all.
Mark TwainBut keeping secrets is a discipline. I never use to think of myself as a good liar, but after having had some practice I had adopted the prevaricator's credo that one doesn't so much fabricate a lie as marry it. A successful lie cannot be brought into this world and capriciously abandoned; like any committed relationship it must be maintained, and with far more devotion than the truth, which carries on being carelessly true without any help. By contrast, my lie needed me as much as I needed it, and so demanded the constancy of wedlock: Till death do us part.
Lionel ShriverI would assign every lie a color: yellow when they were innocent, pale blue when they sailed over you like the sky, red because I knew they drew blood. And then there was the black lie. That's the worst of all. A black lie was when I told you the truth.
Steve MartinYou don't lie to your own doctor. You don't lie to your own attorney, and you don't lie to your employees.
Gordon BethuneThe more they do to expose themselves as who they are - but remember, now, most liberals hide who they are, particularly liberal Democrat officeholders and people running for office. They lie about their agenda. They lie about what they believe. They lie and mask who they are.
Rush LimbaughIf you want to become a man of letters and perhaps write some Histories one day, you must also lie and invent tales, otherwise your History would become monotonous. But you must act with restraint. The world condemns liars who do nothing but lie, even about the most trivial things, and it rewards poets, who lie only about the greatest things.
Umberto EcoThat a lie which is all a lie may be met and fought with outright, But a lie which is part a truth is a harder matter to fight.
Alfred Lord TennysonLies hold civilization together. If people ever seriously begin telling each other what they really think, there'd be no peace. Good-bye to tact. Good-bye to being polite. Good-bye to showing tolerance for other people's buffooneries. The fact that we claim to admire Truth is probably the biggest lie of all. But that's part of the charade, part of what makes us human, and we do not even think about it. In effect, we lie to ourselves. Lies are only despicable when they betray a trust.
Jack McDevittSomewhere between the honest truth and the deceptive lie is the deceptive truth and the honest lie.
Robert BreaultI can't believe that we would lie in our graves wondering if we had spent our living days well. I can't believe that we would lie in our graves dreaming of things that we might have been.
Dave MatthewsIn the beginning was the Lie and the Lie was made news and dwelt among us, graceless and false.
Malcolm MuggeridgeIt is not the lie that passeth through the mind, but the lie that sinketh in and settleth in it, that doth the hurt.
Francis BaconOne of my weaknesses happens to be lying, and I could tell you that I'm never going to lie again in my life, but that would be a lie.
Jayson BlairAlways the idea of unbroken quiet broods around the grave. It is a port where the storms of life never beat, and the forms that have been tossed on its chafing waves lie quiet forevermore. There the child nestles as peacefully as ever it lay in its mother's arms, and the workman's hands lie still by his side, and the thinker's brain is pillowed in silent mystery, and the poor girl's broken heart is steeped in a balm that extracts its secret woe, and is in the keeping of a charity that covers all blame.
Edwin Hubbel ChapinThe only way you can control people is to lie to them. You can write that down in your book in great big letters. The only way you can control anybody is to lie to them.
L. Ron HubbardYou lie once.. you lie for the rest of your life... and in quest of proving your innocence.. you pledge your honesty with utter lies.... !!!
Abhijeet SawantThat is why I think, in defiance of Plato, that there is at once error and vulgarity in saying that poetry is a lie, except in the sense that Cocteau wrote one day: I am a lie who always tells the truth. The only poetry which lies purely and simply is academic, pseudo-classical, conceptually repetitive poetry, and it is not poetry.
Jacques MaritainThere are people who will say that this whole account is a lie, but a thing isn't necessarily a lie even if it didn't necessarily happen.
John SteinbeckLive and lie reclined On the hills like Gods together, careless of mankind. For they lie beside their nectar, and the bolts are hurled Far below them in the valleys, and the clouds are lightly curled Round their golden houses, girdled with the gleaming world.
Alfred Lord TennysonI've got a sweater." Ben pulled off his coat and held it out for her. "Here." "Thanks, Ben. It's lovely and warm." Then she said, "Ben, I-- I can tell you how I feel about-- about everything. I think you're the best friend I've ever had. I-- I'd lie down and die for you if you wanted me to." "Honey," Ben said. "When I get you to lie down for me it won't be to die.
Madeleine L'EngleIt's easier to be a grownup than to be a kid. When you're a kid, you lie constantly and people are always calling you on it. And when you're a grownup, you lie constantly and people rarely do. Children are constantly being caught. Adults rarely so. Being an adult, you also get a free pass, which means you have to actively be a good person because nobody's around to tell you to do that. Even evil kids will be good when adults are watching. But once you're an adult, no one is. As a grownup, you've got an agency over your own life, which hopefully you use for the greater good and not evil.
Simon RichDo you think that Gwendolyn Brooks would give an award to someone who hated Black women, the lie that was circulated throughout New York and reached all the way down to Martinique where I was a guest Professor? The lie was circulated by people who don't read my books.
Ishmael ReedI know the resurrection is a fact, and Watergate proved it to me. How? Because 12 men testified they had seen Jesus raised from the dead, then they proclaimed that truth for 40 years, never once denying it. Every one was beaten, tortured, stoned and put in prison. They would not have endured that if it weren't true. Watergate embroiled 12 of the most powerful men in the world-and they couldn't keep a lie for three weeks. You're telling me 12 apostles could keep a lie for 40 years? Absolutely impossible.
Charles ColsonI'm telling you a lie in a vicious effort that you will repeat my lie over and over until it becomes true
Lady GagaPeople lie because they don't remember clear what they saw. People lie because they can't help making a story better than it was the way it happened.
Carl Sandburg"It is a sensation not experienced by many mortals," said he, "to be looking into a churchyard on a wild windy night, and to feel that I no more hold a place among the living than these dead do, and even to know that I lie buried somewhere else, as they lie buried here. Nothing uses me to it. A spirit that was once a man could hardly feel stranger or lonelier, going unrecognized among mankind, than I feel."
Charles DickensPeople are so docile right now. It is almost as if good government means when the politicians lie to us for our own good, for the public good, and bad government is when politicians lie for their own selfish interests.
James BovardIf the world were not so full of people, and most of them did not have to work so hard, there would be more time for them to get out and lie on the grass, and there would be more grass for them to lie on.
Don MarquisHow many hopes and dreams are trapped within these bones? How many wonders lie never to be discovered? This is what war is. Desolation, despair and loss. There are no victors.
David GemmellThe Prophet (peace be upon him) said, 'The signs of a hypocrite are three: 1. Whenever he speaks, he tells a lie. 2. Whenever he promises, he always breaks it (his promise). 3. If you trust him, he proves to be dishonest (if you keep something as a trust with him, he will not return it).'
Abu Hurairah