Plato Quotes

I am a physician. I keep a drug-shop of lies. I give relief, consolation. Can one console and relieve without lying? ... Only women and doctors know how necessary and how helpful lies are to men.

No. Men should die for lies. But the truth is too precious to die for.

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.

A liar must have a good memory. -Mendacem oportet esse memorem

Love is the first lie; wisdom the last.

Lies exist only to be extinguished.

Nearly everyone will lie to you, given the right circumstances.

Your bait of falsehood takes this carp of truth.

None of us suffers as much as we should, or loves as much as we say. Love is the first lie; wisdom the last.

Every decent con man knows that the simplest truth is more powerful than even the most elaborate lie.

In plain truth, lying is an accursed vice. We are not men, nor have any other tie upon another, but by our word.

Faith makes blessed. Consequently it lies.

Your truths are worse than your lies.

Denying the undeniable just makes you sound like a fool as well as a liar.

A woman does not want the truth; what is truth to women? From the beginning, nothing has been more alien, repugnant, and hostile to woman than the truth - her great art is the lie, her highest concern is mere appearance and beauty.

No man should tell a lie unless he is shrewd enough to recognize the time for renouncing it, if and when it comes, and knows how to renounce it gracefully.

...a truth you don't understand is more dangerous than a lie.

The size of the lie is a definite factor in causing it to be believed.

A wise man does not waste so good a commodity as lying for naught.

they reminded me of the biggest liar I ever knew personally. Was a farmer, too. Reputation of pretty good farmer at that, but he lied so he had to hire another man to call his pigs.

It is impossible for someone to lie unless he thinks he knows the truth. Producing bullshit requires no such conviction.

I tried to be diplomatic, but mostly I just lied a lot.

He that trusts in a lie, shall perish in truth.

A peace-mingling falsehood is preferable to a mischief-stirring truth.

Falsehood is never in words; it is in things.