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Oliver Wendell Holmes

41 quotes

The quotes of Oliver Wendell Holmes have been shared, printed, and passed along for good reason. Whether reflecting on Truth or Friendship, Oliver Wendell Holmes brought uncommon clarity to every subject. Explore 52 quotes by Oliver Wendell Holmes on subjects including Truth, Friendship, Wisdom, Science, and Nature — each one a window into a distinctive way of seeing the world. Readers often gravitate to this one: "The Amen of nature is always a flower."

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“Many people die with their music still in them. Why is this so? Too often it is because they are always getting ready to live. Before they know it, time runs out.”

— Oliver Wendell Holmes

Music

All Quotes by Oliver Wendell Holmes

“Where we love is home - home that our feet may leave, but not our hearts.”

— Oliver Wendell Holmes

Home

“Put not your trust in money, but put your money in trust.”

— Oliver Wendell Holmes

Money

“Don't you stay at home of evenings? Don't you love a cushioned seat in a corner, by the fireside, with your slippers on your feet?”

— Oliver Wendell Holmes

Home

“I hate facts. I always say the chief end of man is to form general propositions - adding that no general proposition is worth a damn.”

— Oliver Wendell Holmes

Science

“It's faith in something and enthusiasm for something that makes a life worth living.”

— Oliver Wendell Holmes

Faith

“Love is the master key that opens the gates of happiness.”

— Oliver Wendell Holmes

Happiness

“Truth, when not sought after, rarely comes to light.”

— Oliver Wendell Holmes

Truth

“Controversy equalizes fools and wise men - and the fools know it.”

— Oliver Wendell Holmes

Men

“If I were dying my last words would be: Have faith and pursue the unknown end.”

— Oliver Wendell Holmes

Faith

“A pun does not commonly justify a blow in return. But if a blow were given for such cause, and death ensued, the jury would be judges both of the facts and of the pun, and might, if the latter were of an aggravated character, return a verdict of justifiable homicide.”

— Oliver Wendell Holmes

Death

“The sound of a kiss is not so loud as that of a cannon, but its echo lasts a great deal longer.”

— Oliver Wendell Holmes

Great

“Without wearing any mask we are conscious of, we have a special face for each friend.”

— Oliver Wendell Holmes

Friendship

“A goose flies by a chart which the Royal Geographical Society could not mend.”

— Oliver Wendell Holmes

Society

“Have the courage to act instead of react.”

— Oliver Wendell Holmes

Courage

“If there is any principle of the Constitution that more imperatively calls for attachment than any other it is the principle of free thought, not free thought for those who agree with us but freedom for the thought that we hate.”

— Oliver Wendell Holmes

Freedom

“The real religion of the world comes from women much more than from men - from mothers most of all, who carry the key of our souls in their bosoms.”

— Oliver Wendell Holmes

Religion

“Every library should try to be complete on something, if it were only the history of pinheads.”

— Oliver Wendell Holmes

History

“Memories, imagination, old sentiments, and associations are more readily reached through the sense of smell than through any other channel.”

— Oliver Wendell Holmes

Imagination

“Truth is tough. It will not break, like a bubble, at a touch nay, you may kick it about all day like a football, and it will be round and full at evening.”

— Oliver Wendell Holmes

Truth

“A new untruth is better than an old truth.”

— Oliver Wendell Holmes

Truth