Sydney J. Harris Quotes

From a worldly point of view, there is no mistake so great as that of being always right.

I learned that very often the most intolerant and narrow-minded people are the ones who congratulate themselves on their tolerance and open-mindedness.

None are so fallible as those who are sure they're right.

Sinners think they are saints, but saints know they are sinners.

The reason he [Jimmy Carter] says he never lies is because he thinks the truth originates with him.

Believing ourselves to be possessors of absolute truth degrades us: we regard every person whose way of thinking is different from ours as a monster and a threat and by so doing turn our own selves into monsters and threats to our fellows.

When a man tells you that he knows the exact truth about anything you are safe in inferring that he is an inexact man.

No one is more dangerous than someone who thinks he has "The Truth". To be an atheist is almost as arrogant as to be a fundamentalist. But then again, I can get pretty arrogant.

Do not believe that you alone can be right.The man who thinks that,The man who maintains that only he has the powerTo reason correctly, the gift to speak, the soul-A man like that, when you know him, turns out empty.

Those who are convinced they have a monopoly on The Truth always feel that they are only saving the world when they slaughter the heretics.

Of all the cants which are canted in this canting world, - though the cant of hypocrites may be the worst, - the cant of criticism is the most tormenting!

No one lies so boldly as the man who is indignant.

Self-righteousness has killed more people than smoking.

Pretensions to moral superiority are devastatingly destructive.

Those who believe that they have absolute truth and the only moral system are destructive both to themselves and to those whom they try to convert.

Whenever you are faced with someone who has made far more errors in judgment and far more mistakes than you, you have a tendency to get on your high horse.

The belief that there is only one truth, and that oneself is in possession of it, is the root of all evil in the world.

Intolerance is a form of egotism, and to condemn egotism intolerantly is to share it.

Every contrition for sin is apt to encourage a not quite charitable wish that other people should exhibit a similar contrition.

That Newt Gingrich or any mainstream Republican has the nerve to look down from what they perceive as their moral mountaintop at anyone is laughable.

The thing I hate the most in any kind of writing is self-righteousness. Where you pretend you don't have the same kinds of flaws your subject has.

I don't like false modesty.

I suppose that one is always tempted to challenge those who think that they and they alone possess the truth or the way or the key to the mystery.

We think we know what's right. With excessive pride comes blindness.

It is the certainty that they possess the truth that makes men cruel.