Quotes from The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

“Women are naturally secretive, and they like to do their own secreting.”
― Arthur Conan Doyle, quote from The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

“Never trust to general impressions, my boy, but concentrate yourself upon details.”
― Arthur Conan Doyle, quote from The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

“As a rule, 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.”
― Arthur Conan Doyle, quote from The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

“Come, Watson, come!" he cried. The game is afoot.”
― Arthur Conan Doyle, quote from The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

“To Sherlock Holmes she is always the woman. I have seldom heard him mention her under any other name. In his eyes she eclipses and predominates the whole of her sex. It was not that he felt any emotion akin to love for Irene Adler. All emotions, and that one particularly, were abhorrent to his cold, precise but admirably balanced mind. He was, I take it, the most perfect reasoning and observing machine that the world has seen.... And yet there was but one woman to him, and that woman was the late Irene Adler, of dubious and questionable memory.”
― Arthur Conan Doyle, quote from The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

“Violence does, in truth, recoil upon the violent, and the schemer falls into the pit which he digs for another.”
― Arthur Conan Doyle, quote from The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

“Circumstantial evidence is a very tricky thing. It may seem to point very straight to one thing, but if you shift your own point of view a little, you may find it pointing in an equally uncompromising manner to something entirely different”
― Arthur Conan Doyle, quote from The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

“The future was with Fate. The present was our own.

~ The Poison Belt”
― Arthur Conan Doyle, quote from The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

“When a doctor does go wrong he is the first of criminals.”
― Arthur Conan Doyle, quote from The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

“A sandwich and a cup of coffee, and then off to violin-land, where all is sweetness and delicacy and harmony.”
― Arthur Conan Doyle, quote from The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

“The stage lost a fine actor, even as science lost an acute reasoner, when [Holmes] became a specialist in crime.”
― Arthur Conan Doyle, quote from The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

“It's a wicked world, and when a clever man turns his brain to crime it is the worst of all.”
― Arthur Conan Doyle, quote from The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

“It is a capital mistake to theorise before one has data.”
― Arthur Conan Doyle, quote from The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

“Art in the blood is liable to take the strangest forms.”
― Arthur Conan Doyle, quote from The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

“It is more than possible; it is probable.”
― Arthur Conan Doyle, quote from The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

“Well, well, my dear fellow, be it so. We have shared this same room for some years, and it would be amusing if we ended by sharing the same cell. (...)”
― Arthur Conan Doyle, quote from The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

“This looks like one of those unwelcome social summonses which call upon a man either to be bored or to lie.”
― Arthur Conan Doyle, quote from The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

“He is not a bad fellow, though an absolute imbecile in his profession. He has one positive virtue. He is as brave as a bulldog and as tenacious as a lobster if he gets his claws upon anyone.”
― Arthur Conan Doyle, quote from The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

“I have taken to living by my wits.”
― Arthur Conan Doyle, quote from The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

“Depend upon it, there is nothing so unnatural as the commonplace.”
― Arthur Conan Doyle, quote from The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

“Watson, you can see everything. You fail, however, to reason from what you see.”
― Arthur Conan Doyle, quote from The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

“Problems may be solved in the study which have baffled all those who have sought a solution by the aid of their senses. To carry the art, however, to its highest pitch, it is necessary that the reasoner should be able to use all the facts which have come to his knowledge; and this in itself implies, as you will readily see, a possession of all knowledge, which, even in these days of free education and encyclopaedias, is a somewhat rare accomplishment.”
― Arthur Conan Doyle, quote from The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

“I think that I had better go, Holmes."
"Not a bit, doctor. Stay where you are. I am lost without my Boswell.”
― Arthur Conan Doyle, quote from The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

“Well," he said, "I say, now, as I said then, that a man should keep his little brain-attic stocked with all the furniture that he is likely to use, and the rest he can put away in the lumber-room of this library, where he can get it if he wants it.”
― Arthur Conan Doyle, quote from The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

“Now, Watson,” said Holmes, as a tall dog-cart dashed up through the gloom, throwing out two golden tunnels of yellow light from its side lanterns. “You’ll come with me, won’t you?”
“If I can be of use.”
“Oh, a trusty comrade is always of use; and a chronicler still more so. My room at The Cedars is a double-bedded one.”
― Arthur Conan Doyle, quote from The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

“I confess that I have been as blind as a mole, but is is better to learn wisdom late than never to learn it at all.”
― Arthur Conan Doyle, quote from The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

“A sandwich and a cup of coffee, and then off to violin-land, where all is sweetness and delicacy and harmony, and there are no red-headed clients to vex us with their conundrums.”
― Arthur Conan Doyle, quote from The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

“There are women in whom the love of a lover extinguishes all other loves, and I think that she must have been one.”
― Arthur Conan Doyle, quote from The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

“Draw your chair up, and hand me my violin, for the only problem which we have still to solve is how to while away these bleak autumnal evenings.”
― Arthur Conan Doyle, quote from The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

“It is the German who is so uncourteous to his verbs”
― Arthur Conan Doyle, quote from The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

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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.