Famous Quotes & Sayings

Benjamin Franklin

Alas, I know if I ever became truly humble, I would be proud of it.

Benjamin Franklin

Humility makes great men twice honorable

Benjamin Franklin

My List of Virtues contain'd at first but twelve: But a Quaker Friend having kindly inform'd me that I was generally thought proud; that my Pride show'd itself frequently in Conversation; that I was not content with being in the right when discussing any Point, but was overbearing & rather insolent; of which he convinc'd me by mentioning several Instances; - I determined endeavouring to cure myself ..., and I added Humility to my List, giving an extensive Meaning to the Word.

Benjamin Franklin

In going on with these Experiments, how many pretty systems do we build, which we soon find ourselves oblig'd to destroy! If there is no other Use discover'd of Electricity, this, however, is something considerable, that it may help to make a vain Man humble.

Benjamin Franklin

E'er you remark another's sin, bid your own conscience look within.

Benjamin Franklin

A good spouse and health is a person's best wealth.

Benjamin Franklin

The good or ill hap of a good or ill life, is the good or ill choice of a good or ill wife.

Benjamin Franklin

The tongue offends and the ears get the cuffing

Benjamin Franklin

Mary's mouth cost her nothing for she never opens it but at others' expense.

Benjamin Franklin

I've striven my whole life for humility, but if I'd ever achieved it, I'd probably be pretty damn proud of that.

Ben Bernanke

Both humanity's capacity to innovate and the incentives to innovate are greater today than at any other time in history.

Ben Affleck

I'm human, just like anybody else.

Barbara Walters

A good laugh makes any interview, or any conversation, so much better.

Arthur Conan Doyle

Might I trouble you to open the window, for chloroform vapour does not help the palate.

Arthur Conan Doyle

He had never seen a woman doctor before, and his whole conservative soul rose up in revolt at the idea. He could not recall any biblical injunction that the man should remain ever the doctor and the woman the nurse, and yet he felt as if a blasphemy had been committed.

Arthur Conan Doyle

The less experienced a doctor is, the higher are his notions of professional dignity . . .

Arthur Conan Doyle

The sky was of the deepest blue, with a few white, fleecy clouds drifting lazily across it, and the air was filled with the low drone of insects or with a sudden sharper note as bee or bluefly shot past with its quivering, long-drawn hum, like an insect tuning-fork.

Arthur Conan Doyle

"There are one or two elementary rules to be observed in the way of handling patients," he remarked, seating himself on the table and swinging his legs. "The most obvious is that you must never let them see that you want them. It should be pure condescension on your part seeing them at all; and the more difficulties you throw in the way of it, the more they think of it. Break your patients in early, and keep them well to heel."

Arthur Conan Doyle

"Dr. Munro, sir," said he, "I am a walking museum. You could fit what ISN'T the matter with me on to the back of a -- visiting card. If there's any complaint you want to make a special study of, just you come to me, sir, and see what I can do for you. It's not every one that can say that he has had cholera three times, and cured himself by living on red pepper and brandy."

Arthur Conan Doyle

I am engaged in answering that Italian buffoon, Mazotti, whose views upon the larval development of the tropical termites have excited my derision and contempt . . .

Arthur Conan Doyle

"I have seen those symptoms before," said Holmes, throwing his cigarette into the fire. "Oscillation upon the pavement always means an affaire de coeur."

Arthur Conan Doyle

There seems to me to be absolutely no limit to the inanity and credulity of the human race. Homo Sapiens! Homo idioticus!

Arthur Conan Doyle

One dumb-bell, Watson! Consider an athlete with one dumb-bell. Picture to yourself the unilateral development - the imminent danger of a spinal curvature. Shocking, Watson, shocking!

Arthur Conan Doyle

I think you want a little unofficial help. Three undetected murders in one year won't do, Lestrade. But you handled the Molesey Mystery with less than your usual - that's to say, you handled it fairly well.

Arthur Conan Doyle

Living, as I do, in an educated and scientific atmosphere, I could not have conceived that the first principles of zoology were so little known. Is it possible that you do not know the elementary fact in comparative anatomy, that the wing of a bird is really the forearm, while the wing of a bat consists of three elongated fingers with membranes between?

Arthur Conan Doyle

We had got as far as this, when who should walk in but the gentleman himself, who had been drinking his beer in the taproom and had heard the whole conversation. Who was I? What did I want? What did I mean by asking questions? He had a fine flow of language, and his adjectives were very vigorous.

Arthur Conan Doyle

And yet the motives of women are so inscrutable. You remember the woman at Margate whom I suspected for the same reason. No powder on her nose - that proved to be the correct solution. How can you build on such a quicksand? Their most trivial action may mean volumes, or their most extraordinary conduct may depend upon a hairpin or a curling tongs.

Arthur C. Clarke

Astronomy, as nothing else can do, teaches men humility.

Anton Chekhov

What must human beings be, to destroy what they can never create?

Anton Chekhov

The world is a fine place. The only thing wrong with it is us. How little justice and humility there is in us, how poorly we understand patriotism!

Baltasar Gracian

What the multitude says, is so, or soon will be so.

Austin Butler

When you're doing fantasy, you can get so caught up in the magic of it that you lose the humanity.

Aung San Suu Kyi

As we strive to teach others we must have the humility to acknowledge that we too still have much to learn.