19 Georg Christoph Lichtenberg Quotes on Truth

Georg Christoph Lichtenberg quotes on truth

1. It is almost impossible to bear the torch of truth through a crowd without singeing somebody's beard.

15. If an angel were ever to tell us anything of his philosophy I believe many propositions would sound like 2 times 2 equals 13.

16. We often have need of a profound philosophy to restore to our feelings their original state of innocence, to find our way out of the rubble of things alien to us, to begin to feel for ourselves and to speak ourselves, and I might almost say to exist ourselves. Even if my philosophy does not extend to discovering anything new, it does nevertheless possess the courage to regard as questionable what has long been thought true.

20. Even truth needs to be clad in new garments if it is to appeal to a new age.

21. Once the good man was dead, one wore his hat and another his sword as he had worn them, a third had himself barbered as he had, a fourth walked as he did, but the honest man that he was - nobody any longer wanted to be that.

27. Nowadays three witty turns of phrase and a lie make a writer.

35. If it were true what in the end would be gained? Nothing but another truth. Is this such a mighty advantage? We have enough old truths still to digest, and even these we would be quite unable to endure if we did not sometimes flavor them with lies.

43. There are people who believe everything is sane and sensible that is done with a solemn face. ... It is no great art to say something briefly when, like Tacitus, one has something to say; when one has nothing to say, however, and none the less writes a whole book and makes truth ... into a liar - that I call an achievement.

61. Man is always partial and is quite right to be. Even impartiality is partial.

66. Much can be inferred about a man from his mistress: in her one beholds his weaknesses and his dreams.

68. The most successful tempters and thus the most dangerous are the deluded deluders.

69. What is the good of drawing conclusions from experience? I don't deny we sometimes draw the right conclusions, but don't we just as often draw the wrong ones?

77. The American who first discovered Columbus made a bad discovery.

81. The most dangerous untruths are truths moderately distorted.

89. Delight at having understood a very abstract and obscure system leads most people to believe in the truth of what it demonstrates.

93. It is said that truth comes from the mouths of fools and children: I wish every good mind which feels an inclination for satire would reflect that the finest satirist always has something of both in him.

102. He who says he hates every kind of flattery, and says it in earnest, certainly does not yet know every kind of flattery.

111. There were honest people long before there were Christians and there are, God be praised, still honest people where there are no Christians. It could therefore easily be possible that people are Christians because true Christianity corresponds to what they would have been even if Christianity did not exist.

134. Men still have to be governed by deception.