Quotes from The Body in the Library

“What I feel is that if one has got to have a murder actually happening in one's house, one might as well enjoy it, if you know what I mean.”
― Agatha Christie, quote from The Body in the Library

“Downstairs in the lounge, by the third pillar from the left, there sits an old lady with a sweet, placid, spinsterish face and a mind that has plumbed the depths of human iniquity and taken it all as in the day's work....where crime is concerned, she's the goods.”
― Agatha Christie, quote from The Body in the Library

“No innocent person ever has an alibi.”
― Agatha Christie, quote from The Body in the Library

“One does see so much evil in a village,' murmured Miss Marple in an explanatory voice.”
― Agatha Christie, quote from The Body in the Library

“No, I wouldn't. I wouldn’t tell a soul.'

'People who use that phrase are always the last to live up to it.”
― Agatha Christie, quote from The Body in the Library

“Because when you’re in love, you think you’re invincible. It blinds you. And you don’t seem to care.”
― Agatha Christie, quote from The Body in the Library

“Bottled, was he?" Said Colonel Bantry, with an Englishman's sympathy for alcoholic excess. "Oh, well, can't judge a fellow by what he does when he's drunk? When I was at Cambridge, I remember I put a certain utensil - well - well, nevermind.”
― Agatha Christie, quote from The Body in the Library

“So I suggest you cut the cackle and come to the horses.”
― Agatha Christie, quote from The Body in the Library

“Melchett said gloomily, 'Well, we know where we are -- or rather, where we aren't!'

'Where we aren't expresses it rather better, sir.”
― Agatha Christie, quote from The Body in the Library

“People who ought to die of shock and exposure don't die of shock and exposure, et cetera, et cetera. The human frame is tougher than one can imagine possible. Moreover, in my experience, a physical shock is more often fatal than a mental shock.”
― Agatha Christie, quote from The Body in the Library

“Yes. She rebelled, I suppose, against being made to live in the past. After all, there's a time for everything. You can't sit in the house with the blinds down forever.”
― Agatha Christie, quote from The Body in the Library

“She belonged to the class that wear their best clothes, however unsuitable to the occasion. Last year, you know, we had a picnic outing at Scrantor Rocks. You'd be surprised at the unsuitable clothes the girls wore. Foulard dresses and patent-leather shoes and quite elaborate hats, some of them. For climbing about over rocks and in gorse and heather. And the young men in their best suits. Of course, hiking's different again. That's practically a uniform, and girls don't seem to realize that shorts are very unbecoming unless they are very slender.”
― Agatha Christie, quote from The Body in the Library

“When people ask “Do you put real people in your books?” the answer is that, for me, it is quite impossible to write about anyone I know, or have ever spoken to, or indeed have even heard about! For some reason, it kills them for me stone dead.”
― Agatha Christie, quote from The Body in the Library

“The vicar, a gentle, middle-aged man, was always the last to hear anything.”
― Agatha Christie, quote from The Body in the Library

“With a sigh the young mother returned to the hearthrug and, by way of carrying out her principles of stern neglect, butted her son three times in the stomach so that he caught hold of her hair and pulled it with gleeful yells. Then they rolled over and over in a grand rough-and-tumble until the door opened”
― Agatha Christie, quote from The Body in the Library

“La verità è che la maggior parte della gente, non esclusi i poliziotti, si fida troppo di questo mondo perverso. Crede troppo a quanto viene loro raccontato. Io no. Mi dispiace, ma io voglio sempre rendermi conto personalmente delle cose.”
― Agatha Christie, quote from The Body in the Library

“Activity was always to Inspector Slack’s taste. To rush off in a car, to silence rudely those people who were anxious to tell him things, to cut short conversations on the plea of urgent necessity. All this was the breath of life to Slack.”
― Agatha Christie, quote from The Body in the Library

“Mrs. Bantry reflected a minute and then applied an urgent conjugal elbow to her sleeping spouse.”
― Agatha Christie, quote from The Body in the Library

“Det kan du stole på. Liker du detektivfortellinger? Det gjør jeg. Jeg leser alle sammen, og har navnetrekkene til Dorothy Sayers og Agatha Christie og Dickson Carr og H.C. Bailey.”
― Agatha Christie, quote from The Body in the Library

“Either her dream had taken a very odd turn or else - or else Mary had really rushed into the room and had said (incredible! fantastic!) that there was a body in the library.”
― Agatha Christie, quote from The Body in the Library

“One does see so much evil in a village,” murmured Miss Marple in an explanatory voice.”
― Agatha Christie, quote from The Body in the Library

“Here was a man who would never rail against fate but accept it and pass on to victory”
― Agatha Christie, quote from The Body in the Library

“Felébredéskor az álmok gyakran csodálatosan valódinak hatnak. Az ember meg van győződve arról, hogy a dolgok valóban megtörténtek.”
― Agatha Christie, quote from The Body in the Library

“for a minute her good-natured blue eyes were hard and sharp; she was the female fighting for existence—“that”
― Agatha Christie, quote from The Body in the Library

“A maguk… veszekedései jellemzőek a házasság első hónapjaiban. Teljesen… mások, mint egy törvénytelen kapcsolatnál. Tudja, azt mondják… és azt hiszem, ez igaz, hogy csak akkor lehet igazán nekimenni valakinek, ha az ember össze van vele házasodva. Ha nincsen… törvényes kötelék, akkor az emberek sokkal óvatosabbak; állandóan bizonygatják önmaguknak, hogy minden milyen szép és jó. Igazolniuk kell magukat önmaguk előtt. Nem mernek veszekedni! Észrevettem, hogy a házastársak még élvezik is a csatáikat, és… a megfelelő kibéküléseket.”
― Agatha Christie, quote from The Body in the Library

“Colonel Melchett silently marvelled at the amount of aids to beauty that women could use. Rows of jars of face cream, cleansing cream, vanishing cream, skin-feeding cream! Boxes of different shades of powder. An untidy heap of every variety of lipstick. Hair lotions and “brightening” applications. Eyelash black, mascara, blue stain for under the eyes, at least twelve different shades of nail varnish, face tissues, bits of cotton wool, dirty powder-puffs. Bottles of lotions—astringent, tonic, soothing, etc. “Do you mean to say,” he murmured feebly, “that women use all these things?” Inspector Slack, who always knew everything, kindly enlightened him. “In private life, sir, so to speak, a lady keeps to one or two distinct shades, one for evening, one for day. They know what suits them and they keep to it. But these professional girls, they have to ring a change, so to speak. They do exhibition dances, and one night it’s a tango and the next a crinoline Victorian dance and then a kind of Apache dance and then just ordinary ballroom, and, of course, the makeup varies a good bit.” “Good lord!” said the Colonel. “No wonder the people who turn out these creams and messes make a fortune.” “Easy money, that’s what it is,” said Slack. “Easy money. Got to spend a bit in advertisement, of course.” Colonel”
― Agatha Christie, quote from The Body in the Library

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Popular quotes

“Just when we are most eager to make ourselves understood, we must strive to understand. Just when we seek to air our grievances, we must labor to comprehend another’s hurt. Just when we want to point out the fallacies and abusive behavior of someone else, we must ruthlessly evaluate our own offensive attitudes and behaviors.”
― Gary L. Thomas, quote from Sacred Marriage: Celebrating Marriage as a Spiritual Discipline

“Cuando regresaron, el escultor les mostró el caballo terminado.

Y uno de los niños, con los ojos muy abiertos, le preguntó:

-Pero... ¿Cómo sabías que adentro de aquella piedra había un caballo?”
― Eduardo Galeano, quote from Days and Nights of Love and War

“[There is] a widespread approach to ideas which Objectivism repudiates altogether: agnosticism. I mean this term in a sense which applies to the question of God, but to many other issues also, such as extra-sensory perception or the claim that the stars influence man’s destiny. In regard to all such claims, the agnostic is the type who says, “I can’t prove these claims are true, but you can’t prove they are false, so the only proper conclusion is: I don’t know; no one knows; no one can know one way or the other.”

The agnostic viewpoint poses as fair, impartial, and balanced. See how many fallacies you can find in it. Here are a few obvious ones: First, the agnostic allows the arbitrary into the realm of human cognition. He treats arbitrary claims as ideas proper to consider, discuss, evaluate—and then he regretfully says, “I don’t know,” instead of dismissing the arbitrary out of hand. Second, the onus-of-proof issue: the agnostic demands proof of a negative in a context where there is no evidence for the positive. “It’s up to you,” he says, “to prove that the fourth moon of Jupiter did not cause your sex life and that it was not a result of your previous incarnation as the Pharaoh of Egypt.” Third, the agnostic says, “Maybe these things will one day be proved.” In other words, he asserts possibilities or hypotheses with no jot of evidential basis.

The agnostic miscalculates. He thinks he is avoiding any position that will antagonize anybody. In fact, he is taking a position which is much more irrational than that of a man who takes a definite but mistaken stand on a given issue, because the agnostic treats arbitrary claims as meriting cognitive consideration and epistemological respect. He treats the arbitrary as on a par with the rational and evidentially supported. So he is the ultimate epistemological egalitarian: he equates the groundless and the proved. As such, he is an epistemological destroyer. The agnostic thinks that he is not taking any stand at all and therefore that he is safe, secure, invulnerable to attack. The fact is that his view is one of the falsest—and most cowardly—stands there can be.”
― Leonard Peikoff, quote from Objectivism: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand

“The public is fortunate. Everything pleases them: icecream cones, rock concerts, singing, swinging, love, hate, masturbation, hot dogs, country dances, Jesus Christ, roller skating, spiritualism, capitalism, communism, circumcision, comic strips, Bob Hope, skiing, fishing murder bowling debating, anything. They don’t expect much and they don’t get much. They are one grand gang.”
― Charles Bukowski, quote from South of No North

“Keep thy heart (or imagination) with all diligence, for out of it are the issues of life." (Prov. 4:23.)”
― quote from The Game Of Life How To Play It

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