“Truth is eternal. Knowledge is changeable. It is disastrous to confuse them.”
― Madeleine L'Engle, quote from An Acceptable Time
“My dear, I'm seldom sure of anything. Life at best is a precarious business, and we aren't told that difficult or painful things won't happen, just that it matters. It matters not just to us but to the entire universe.”
― Madeleine L'Engle, quote from An Acceptable Time
“But if I knew everything, there would be no wonder, because what I believe in is far more than I know.”
― Madeleine L'Engle, quote from An Acceptable Time
“My dear, I'm seldom sure of anything. Life at best is a precarious business...”
― Madeleine L'Engle, quote from An Acceptable Time
“Okay, Polly,” her grandfather said. “Let’s have some normal, ordinary lesson time. What is Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle?”
― Madeleine L'Engle, quote from An Acceptable Time
“Let's never try to get even with our enemies, because if we do we will hurt
ourselves far more than we hurt them. Let's do as General Eisenhower does: let's never
waste a minute thinking about people we don't like.”
― Dale Carnegie, quote from How to Stop Worrying and Start Living
“I'm a fucking porcupine with points.”
― Chuck Hogan, quote from Prince of Thieves
“If you’re not a criminal, then what are you doing stealing all these swords and things?” For a moment he was silent. Then he rubbed his chin and said, “There’s no name for it in English.” “Oh, is there not? ‘Burglary’ seems descriptive enough.” “Kyojitsu.” He looked levelly into her eyes, not wavering. “False-true.”
― Laura Kinsale, quote from The Shadow and the Star
“No longer did she look like a shy little maid who was trained to censor her thought before it reached her mouth. These past few days had turned her into a reserved yet intelligent young woman.”
― Kien Nguyen, quote from The Unwanted: A Memoir of Childhood
“If now we attend to ourselves on occasion of any transgression of duty, we shall find that we in fact do not will that our maxim should be universal law, for that is impossible for us; on the contrary, we will that the opposite should remain a universal law, only we assume the liberty of making an exception in our own favor or (just for this time only) in favor of our inclination. Consequently, if we considered all cases from one and the same point of view, namely, that of reason, we should find a contradiction in our own will, namely, that a certain principle should be objectively necessary as a universal law, and yet subjectively should not be universal, but admit of exceptions. As, however, we at one moment regard our action from the point of view of a will wholly conformed to reason, and then again look at the same action from the point of view of a will affected by inclination, there is not really any contradiction, but an antagonism of inclination to the precept of reason, whereby the universality of the principle is changed into mere generality, so that the practical principle of reason shall meet the maxim half way. Now, although this cannot be justified in our own impartial judgement, yet it proves that we do really recognize the validity of the categorical imperative and (with all respect for it) only allow ourselves a few exceptions which we think unimportant and forced from us.”
― Immanuel Kant, quote from Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals
BookQuoters is a community of passionate readers who enjoy sharing the most meaningful, memorable and interesting quotes from great books. As the world communicates more and more via texts, memes and sound bytes, short but profound quotes from books have become more relevant and important. For some of us a quote becomes a mantra, a goal or a philosophy by which we live. For all of us, quotes are a great way to remember a book and to carry with us the author’s best ideas.
We thoughtfully gather quotes from our favorite books, both classic and current, and choose the ones that are most thought-provoking. Each quote represents a book that is interesting, well written and has potential to enhance the reader’s life. We also accept submissions from our visitors and will select the quotes we feel are most appealing to the BookQuoters community.
Founded in 2023, BookQuoters has quickly become a large and vibrant community of people who share an affinity for books. Books are seen by some as a throwback to a previous world; conversely, gleaning the main ideas of a book via a quote or a quick summary is typical of the Information Age but is a habit disdained by some diehard readers. We feel that we have the best of both worlds at BookQuoters; we read books cover-to-cover but offer you some of the highlights. We hope you’ll join us.