Henry James Quotes

The truth of an idea is not a stagnant property inherent in it. Truth happens to an idea. It becomes true, is made true by events: its verity is in fact an event, a process: the process namely of its verifying itself...

Any fact is better established by two or three good testimonies than by a thousand arguments.

I have a rule in research: The third time you hear something, it's generally true.

Truth is what works.

Time trieth truth.

It was different, though, knowing something in your thoughts and then hearing it confirmed, made real, planted in the world like a tree

To wear dreams on one's feet is to begin to give a reality to one's dreams.

The greatest achievement was at first and for a time a dream. The oak sleeps in the acorn, the bird waits in the egg, and in the highest vision of the soul a waking angel stirs. Dreams are the seedlings of realities.

Argument is conclusive, but it does not remove doubt, so that the mind may rest in the sure knowledge of the truth, unless it finds it by the method of experiment.

Never question the relevance of truth, but always question the truth of relevance.

I think it will be found that experience, the true source and foundation of all knowledge, invariably confirms its truth.

There is no satisfaction to be derived from having had many of our arguments borne out by events.

A fact never went into partnership with a miracle. Truth scorns the assistance of wonders. A fact will fit every other fact in the universe, and that is how you can tell whether it is or is not a fact. A lie will not fit anything except another lie.

The facts will speak for themselves. Credit them or not, but read!

One finds the truth by making a hypothesis and comparing observations with the hypothesis.

We must reinforce argument with results.

Facts are better than dreams.

Get the facts, or the facts will get you. And when you get them, get them right, or they will get you wrong.

The truth is more important than the facts

Proof rather than argument.

They were giving the substance of truth to what we were dreaming.

Avoid the precepts of those thinkers whose reasoning is not confirmed by experience.

Every word I wrote in my book is documented, certified, true, and correct. The truth wins, and that is my picture.

A good scientific theory is one which is falsifiable, which has not been falsified.

Proof is the product that you put on the field.