Arthur Conan Doyle Quotes

Truth is always a delusion.

Illusions are hazardous, and so are disillusions.

The world we live in is vastly different from the world we think we live in.

I like illusion when it is so convincing that we might as well see reality this way - I like to present to our belief system something that is convincing, that 'we know not to be.'

Perception is not always reality.

Appearances are not held to be a clue to the truth,' said his cousin. 'But we seem to have no other.

We live, after all, in a world where illusions are sacred and truth profane.

We suffer primarily not from our vices or our weaknesses, but from our illusions. We are haunted, not by reality, but by those images we have put in their place.

Belief in the absence of illusions is itself an illusion.

Photography deals exquisitely with appearances, but nothing is what it appears to be.

I already know what things look like - I don't want description. People believe in appearances, and I don't believe in appearances at all.

Belief and seeing: They are both often wrong.

Perception's not reality.

Sometimes what we see, what's going on in front of us, isn't really what's happening.

Better the illusions that exalt us than ten thousand truths.

Pictures can be pretty deceptive.

Things are not at all what they seem to be: oh no, not at all.

It's lies. It's all lies. Some of them are just prettier than others, that's all. People see what they think is there.

Don't let appearances fool you. There's always only one reality!

If they [the dead] should speak, it would be found that in matters of opinion no departed person was exactly what he had passed for in life. They would realise, deep down, that they, and whole nations along with them, are not really what they seem to be-and never can be.

In Shakespeare's world, characters cannot trust their senses. Is the ghost in Hamlet true and truthful, or is it a demon, tempting young Hamlet into murderous sin? Is Juliet dead or merely sleeping? Does Lear really stand at the edge of a great cliff? Or has the Fool deceived him to save his life?

Truth, like light, blinds. Falsehood, on the contrary, is a beautiful twilight that enhances every object.

Success has always been a great liar.

I realize that nothing's as it seems.

Reality seems so simple. We just open our eyes and there it is. But that doesn't mean it is simple.