Tom Stoppard Quotes

A single lie destroys a whole reputation of integrity.

Be a hypocrite if you like, but don't talk like one.

The true value of somebody in this town is very hard to determine. It's all smoke and mirrors.

I don't want to lie. I dislike dishonesty. And I work in Hollywood, a town and a business that relies on a lot of falsehoods with people hiding behind different facades. I don't want to be a part of that.

Put away from you a dissembling mouth.

To be persuasive we must be believable. To be believable, we must be truthful.

It's best not to appear to believe what you say but to believe what you say.

A man had rather a hundred lies told of him than one truth which he does not wish to be told.

I am not a politician. A politician is someone who does things to get elected. He's a guy who says things to please the public, that he thinks the public wants to hear, and his story changes with every passing day. I want to be elected, but I am not going to say a damn thing for your benefit, or that person's benefit out there on the street, or anybody's

Truth: An ingenious compound of desirability and appearance …

We tell only part of a man's qualities in his presence, and all of them when he is not present.

It is foreign to the Cherokee principle to feign friendship where it does not exist.

It might be said that the pose of absolute honesty is the most dishonest one of all.

All I can say is anybody who's spent most of his life living a lie is not somebody I admire.

I have little time for sincerity.

You become uneasy with people in direct proportion to how many lies you have to keep track of in their presence.

One man lies in his words, and gets a bad reputation; another in his manners, and enjoys a good one.

It is dishonorable to say one thing and think another; how much more dishonorable to write one thing and think another.

It seems pointless to be quoted if one isn't going to be quotable ... it's better to be quotable than honest.

Somebody said I am the most popular person in Arizona because I am speaking the truth.

It's real easy to manufacture what you think the people want to hear. But that's not very honest.

He who observes etiquette but objects to lying is like someone who dresses fashionably but wears no vest.

Society can exist only on the basis that there is some amount of polished lying and that no one says exactly what he thinks.

I am not sincere, even when I say I am not.

I am not honest.