Terry Pratchett Quotes

You shall not steal, nor deal falsely, nor lie to one another.

Better a child should be ignorant of a thousand truths than have consecrated in its heart a single lie.

There are people who think that honesty is always the best policy. This is a superstition. There are times when the appearance of it is worth six of it.

An honorable man or woman is one who is truthful; free from deceit; above cheating, lying, stealing, or any form of deception. An honorable man or woman is one who learns early that one cannot do wrong and feel right. A man's character is judged on how he keeps his word and his agreements.

Dyson's Law: Do ask; don't lie.

Whenever you find a man who says he does not believe in a real Right and Wrong, you will find the same man going back on this a moment later. He may break his promise to you, but if you try breaking one to him he will be complaining 'It's not fair' before you can say Jack Robinson.

It is my belief... that the truth is generally preferable to lies.

If I have one wish which is greater than another, it is, if I had the power, to make men do right; to make them stop their swearing, their lying, their deceiving, to stop trying to injure the innocent, and begin to be honest and upright in all their dealings with one another and honor the name of the Deity.

Nothing makes a man so virtuous as belief of the truth. A lying doctrine will soon beget a lying practice. A man cannot have an erroneous belief without by-and-by having an erroneous life. I believe the one thing naturally begets the other.

I don't think lying has any ultimate justification. I don't think it ever leads to anything positive. The good fight to have is not to lie. That's one of the challenges in a way.

When a man lies, he murders some part of the world.

I don't like to tell lies.

An untruth must be spoken, where need requires. For whether men lie, or say true, it is with one and the same object. Men lie, because they think to gain by deceiving others; and speak the truth, because they expect to get something by their true speaking, and to be trusted afterwards in more important matters. Thus, though their conduct is so opposite, the end of both is alike. If there were no gain to be got, your true-speaking man would tell untruths as much as your liar, and your liar would tell the truth as much as your true-speaking man.

There can be no mercy without truth.

There are many who say more than the truth on some occasions, and balance the account with their consciences by saying less than the truth on others. But the fact is that they are in both instances as fraudulant as he would be that exacted more than his due from his debtors, and paid less than their due to his creditors.

Honesty is better than any policy.

A little lie is like a little pregnancy – it doesn't take long before everyone knows.

It is better to die than to tell a lie

A man who lies, thinking it is the truth, is an honest man, and a man who tells the truth, believing it to be a lie, is a liar.

A man may be very sincere in good principles, without having good practice.

It is as bad to clip conscience as to clip coin; it is as bad to give a counterfeit statement as a counterfeit bill.

I believe in absolute honesty and sensible social lies.

You can't cheat an honest man.

The intention of cheating no one lays us open to being cheated ourselves.

There is an innocence in lying which is the sign of good faith in a cause.