Quotessence
Home / Topics / Doubt Quotes

Doubt Quotes

Browse 5874 quotes about Doubt.

Related topics

No DoubtIfsPeopleThinkingMenKnowsMindBelieveWorldSelfWayMayGivingShouldSelf-doubtHumansWantDoeNeedsWhen In DoubtHas BeensFeelsWellsMeanFirstsMadeBeliefHeartLittlesMomentsStillsSaidPersonsLongTryingFactsYearsWould BeLooksReasonAtheismKindWritingCertaintyInspirationalIdeasRealSometimesStatesEnoughFeelingsSeemsDoneImportantMatterFaithChildrenHardCountryCertainDoubtedScienceChristianEndsSoulTwoBookMightAbilityHelpingLifeBenefitsFacesActionDifferentCausesHandsI BelieveLastsTodayBenefit Of The DoubtShowsWarWholeFearAsksDreamEyeFoundLiteratureLyingProblemSpiritUseReligiousArtClearI CanRunningShadowmore

Doubt Quotes

“When any man expresses doubt to me as to the use that I or any other woman might make of the ballot if we had it, my answer is, What is that to you? If you have for years defrauded me of my rightful inheritance, and then, as a stroke of policy, of from late conviction, concluded to restore to me my own domain, must I ask you whether I may make of it a garden of flowers, or a field of wheat, or a pasture for kine?”

IfsMenYearsMayUseMightAsksMy OwnAnswersDoubtPolicyFieldsFlowerLateGardenConvictionStrokesDomainInheritanceWheatBallotsPastures
Book:History of woman suffrage
Create image

“Mr. Beerbohm in his way is perfect ... He has brought personality into literature, not unconsciously and impurely, but so consciously and purely that we do not know whether there is any relation between Max the essayist and Mr. Beerbohm the man. We only know that the spirit of personality permeates every word that he writes ... He is without doubt the prince of his profession.”

KnowsMenWayWritingSpiritLiteraturePerfectDoubtHe ManPersonalityRelationProfessionMaxEssayists
Author:Virginia Woolf
Create image

“A famous anecdote concerning Cuvier involves the tale of his visitation from the devil—only it was not the devil but one of his students dressed up with horns on his head and shoes shaped like cloven hooves. This frightening apparition burst into Cuvier's bedroom when he was fast asleep and claimed: 'Wake up thou man of catastrophes. I am the Devil. I have come to devour you!' Cuvier studied the apparition carefully and critically said, 'I doubt whether you can. You have horns and hooves. You eat only plants.”

MenSaidDoubtStudentsDevilWake UpPlantShoesTalesFrighteningBedroomCatastropheHornsDressed UpAnecdotesApparitionsVisitationMorphology
Author:Georges Cuvier
Create image

“Here is one of the fundamental defects of American fiction--perhaps the one character that sets it off sharply from all other known kinds of contemporary fiction. It habitually exhibits, not a man of delicate organization in revolt against the inexplicable tragedy of existence, but a man of low sensibilities and elemental desires yielding himself gladly to his environment, and so achieving what, under a third-rate civilization, passes for success. To get on: this is the aim. To weigh and reflect, to doubt and rebel: this is the thing to be avoided.”

MenKindCharacterDesireLiteratureExistenceFictionKnownDoubtEnvironmentAchieveCivilizationLowsOrganizationThirdsTragedyAimFundamentalsRateContemporaryRebelDelicateSensibilityDefectsAvoidedRevoltExhibitsInexplicableContemporary FictionElementalsAmerican Literature
Book:H.L. Mencken: Prejudices: First, Second, and Third Series
Create image

“It was before Deity embodied in a human form walking among men, partaking of their infirmities, leaning on their bosoms, weeping over their graves, slumbering in the manger, bleeding on the cross, that the prejudices of the synagogue, and the doubts of the academy, and the pride of the portico, and the fasces of the lictor, and the swords of thirty legions were humbled in the dust.”

MenHumansFormChristDoubtPrideWalkingCrossesPrejudiceGravesDustThirtyDeitiesWeepingAcademyBosomsBleedingInfirmityLegionSynagogueHuman Form
Author:Thomas B. Macaulay
Create image

“The whole analogy of natural operations furnishes so complete and crushing an argument against the intervention of any but what are termed secondary causes, in the production of all the phenomena of the universe; that, in view of the intimate relations between Man and the rest of the living world; and between the forces exerted by the latter and all other forces, I can see no excuse for doubting that all are co-ordinated terms of Nature's great progression, from the formless to the formed from the inorganic to the organic from blind force to conscious intellect and will.”

MenWorldI CanWholeUniverseForceCausesTermNaturalViewsDoubtConsciousArgumentRelationBlindProductionsExcuseIntellectOperationsIntimateCrushLatterInterventionProgressionAnalogiesNo Excuses
Author:Thomas Huxley
Create image

“No doubt hard work is a great police agent. If everybody were worked from morning till night, and then carefully locked up, the register of crime might be greatly diminished. But what would become of human nature? Where would be the room for growth in such a system of things? It is through sorrow and mirth, plenty and need, a variety of passions, circumstances, and temptations, even through sin and misery, that men's natures are developed.”

IfsMenNeedsHumansHardMightWould BeNightPassionGrowthSinRoomsMorningDoubtHuman NatureCrimeHard WorkCircumstancesSorrowPoliceMiseryTemptationAgentsPlentyVarietyNo DoubtLockedRegisterMirthLocked Up
Book:Friends in Council: A Series of Readings and Discourse Thereon
Create image

“That so many writers have been prepared to accept a kind of martyrdom is the best tribute that flesh can pay to the living spirit of man as expressed in his literature. One cannot doubt that the martyrdom will continue to be gladly embraced. To some of us, the wresting of beauty out of language is the only thing in the world that matters.”

MenWorldKindHas BeensMatterSpiritLiteratureLanguagePayAcceptingDoubtPreparedFleshTributeMartyrdom
Author:Anthony Burgess
Create image

“They [the Founding Fathers] were intent upon establishing a Christian commonwealth in accordance with the principle of self-government. They were an inspired body of men. It has been said that God sifted the nations that He might send choice grain into the wilderness ... Who can fail to see it in the hand of Destiny? Who can doubt that it has been guided by a Divine Providence?”

MenHas BeensSaidSelfBodyHandsGovernmentMightChristianChoicesFatherNationsPrinciplesDestinyDoubtFailingDivineInspiredWildernessGrainProvidenceFoundingCommonwealthSelf-governmentDivine Providence
Author:Calvin Coolidge
Create image

“There is no doubt, that man is not built to be a carnivorous animal. What a sweet, pleasing and innocent sight is the spectacle of a table served that way and what a difference to a make up of fuming animal meat, slaughtered and dead! Man in no way has the constitution of a carnivorous being. Hunt and voracity are unnatural to him. Man has neither the sharp pointed teeth or claws to slaughter his prey. On the contrary his hands are made to pick fruits, berries and vegetables and teeth appropriate to chew them.”

MenWayMadeHandsDifferencesAnimalDoubtSweetPicksBuiltSightConstitutionTablesFruitContraryTeethInnocentMeatNo DoubtAppropriateVegetablesHuntsPreyUnnaturalSlaughterClawsDead ManBerries
Author:John Ray
Create image

“[Golf]is deceptively simple, endlessly complicated. A child can play it well, and a grown man can never master it. Any single round of it is full of unexpected triumphs and perfect shots that end in disaster. It is almost a science, yet it is a puzzle without an answer. It is gratifying and tantalizing, precise and unpredictable. It requires complete concentration and total relaxation. It satisfies the soul and frustrates the intellect. It is at the same time, rewarding and maddening. And it is without doubt the greatest game mankind has ever invented.”

MenWellsChildrenSoulEndsPlayGamesSimpleAnswersPerfectDoubtMankindMastersShotsGolfRoundsComplicatedIntellectDisasterTriumphUnexpectedConcentrationPreciseUnpredictablePuzzlesRelaxationGrown ManTantalizing
Author:Arnold Palmer
Create image

“Stupefaction overrode all other emotion when I saw this creature on the lookout, lying in wait for the game. For it was an ape, a large-sized gorilla. It was in vain that I told myself I was losing my reason: I could entertain not the slightest doubt as to his species. But an encounter with a gorilla on the planet Soror was not the essential outlandishness of the situation. This for me lay in the fact that the ape was correctly dressed, like a man of our world, and above all that he wore his clothes in such an easy manner.”

MenWorldReasonFactsLyingGamesEasyWaitingAnimalEmotionSituationDoubtSawsPlanetsCreaturesEssentialsClothesLosingLaysSpeciesVainEncountersOur WorldApesGorillas
Author:Pierre Boulle
Create image

“Suspicions that the mind, of itself, gathers, are but buzzes; but suspicions that are artificially nourished and put into men's heads by the tales and whisperings of others, have stings.”

MenMindDoubtTalesSuspicionWhispering
Book:The Works of Francis Bacon, Baron of Verulam, Viscount St. Alban, and Lord High Chancellor of England: In Five Volumes
Create image

“"If you are loyal you are successful," ruminated the company paper at one time. "All useful work is raised to the plane of art when love for the task-loyalty-is fused with the effort. Loyalty is the great lubricant of life. It saves the wear and tear of making daily decisions as to what is best to do. The man who is loyal to his work is not wrung nor perplexed by doubts, he sticks to the ship, and if the ship founders he goes down like a hero with colors flying at the masthead and the band playing."”

IfsMenArtDecisionEffortCompanySuccessfulDoubtTearsColorHe ManHeroBandPaperTasksSticksRaisedLoyaltyFlyingShipsPlanesOne TimeLoyalFoundersPerplexed
Author:Thomas Watson
Create image

“Every Man being conscious to himself, That he thinks, and that which his Mind is employ'd about whilst thinking, being the Ideas, that are there, 'tis past doubt, that Men have in their Minds several Ideas, such as are those expressed by the words, Whiteness, Hardness, Sweetness, Thinking, Motion, Man, Elephant, Army, Drunkenness, and others: It is in the first place then to be inquired, How he comes by them? I know it is a received Doctrine, That Men have native Ideas, and original Characters stamped upon their Minds, in their very first Being.”

ThinkingKnowsMenMindFirstsIdeasCharacterPastScienceConsciousnessDoubtConsciousArmyOriginalsEvery ManDoctrineNativeElephantsSweetnessDrunkennessWhitenessHardness
Author:John Locke
Create image

“When a doubt is once received, men labour rather how to keep it a doubt still, than how to solve it; and accordingly bend their wits.”

MenStillsDoubtSolveWitLabour
Book:The philosophical works of Francis Bacon, with prefaces and notes by the late Robert Leslie Ellis, together with English translations of the principal Latin pieces
Create image

“It does not require great art, or magnificently trained eloquence, to prove that Christians should tolerate each other. I, however, am going further: I say that we should regard all men as our brothers. What? The Turk my brother? The Chinaman my brother? The Jew? The Siam? Yes, without doubt; are we not all children of the same father and creatures of the same God?”

MenShouldChildrenDoeArtChristianFatherDoubtBrotherProveCreaturesRegardJewMy BrotherTolerateGreat ArtEloquence
Book:Candide
Create image

“Another error is an impatience of doubt and haste to assertion without due and mature suspension of judgment. For the two ways of contemplation are not unlike the two ways of action commonly spoken of by the ancients; the one plain and smooth in the beginning, and in the end impassable; the other rough and troublesome in the entrance, but after a while fair and even. So it is in contemplation; if a man will begin with certainties, he shall end in doubts; but if he will be content to begin with doubts, he shall end in certainties.”

IfsMenWayTwoEndsActionDoubtHealthyJudgmentFairsErrorsDuesCertaintyContemplationRoughMatureSkepticismSmoothImpatienceTwo WaysAssertionHasteEntrancesTroublesomeSuspension
Author:Francis Bacon
Create image

“The registering of doubts hath two excellent uses: the one, that it saveth philosophy from errors and falsehoods; when that which is not fully appearing is not collected into assertion, whereby error might draw error, but reserved in doubt: the other, that the entry of doubts are as so many suckers or sponges to draw use of knowledge; insomuch as that which, if doubts had not preceded, a man should never have advised, but passed it over without note, by the suggestion and solicitation of doubts, is made to be attended and applied.”

IfsMenShouldMadeTwoPhilosophyUseMightDoubtHealthyDrawsErrorsNotesExcellentFalsehoodSkepticismSuggestionsReservedAssertionEntryAppearingSuckerSpongesSolicitationUse Of Knowledge
Author:Francis Bacon
Create image

“There is nothing makes a man suspect much, more than to know little, and therefore men should remedy suspicion by procuring to know more, and not keep their suspicions in smother.”

KnowsMenShouldLittlesDoubtSuspectsRemedySuspicion
Book:The Works of Francis Bacon, Baron of Verulam, Viscount St. Alban, Lord High Chancellor of England ...: With Several Additional Pieces, Never Before Printed in Any Edition of His Works. To which is Prefixed, a New Life of the Author
Create image

“Truth may perhaps come to the price of a pearl, that showeth best by day; but it will not rise to the price of a diamond or carbuncle, that showeth best in varied lights. A mixture of a lie doth ever add pleasure. Doth any man doubt that, if there were taken out of men's minds vain opinions, flattering hopes, false valuations, imaginations as one would, and the like, but it would leave the minds of a number of men poor shrunken things, full of melancholy and indisposition, and unpleasing to themselves?”

IfsMenMindMayLightLyingImaginationPleasurePoorNumbersOpinionTakenDoubtAddVainMelancholyDiamondPearlsMixturesFlatteringValuation
Book:Bacon's Essays: Top Essays
Create image

“I was not a good doctor, my studies had been too rapid, my hospital training too short, but there is not the slightest doubt that I was a successful doctor. What is the secret of success? To inspire confidence. What is confidence? ... I do not know, I only know that it cannot be acquired by book reading, nor by the bedside of our patients. It is a magic gift granted by birth-right to one man and denied to another. The doctor who possesses this gift can almost raise the dead”

KnowsMenBookReadingSecretStudySuccessfulDoubtMagicInspireBirthTrainingDoctorsRaisesPatientGrantedHospitalsOne ManDeniedToo ShortRapidsDoctor WhoBook ReadingSecret To SuccessGood Doctors
Author:Axel Munthe
Create image

“Most poetry is the utterance of a man in some state of passion, love, joy, grief, rage, etc., and no doubt this is as it should be. But no man is perpetually in a passion and those states in which he is amused and amusing, detached and irreverent, if less important, are no less amusing. If there were no poets who, like Byron, express these states, Poetry would lack something.”

IfsMenShouldImportantStatesJoyPassionGriefDoubtPoetRageNo DoubtEtcPoetry IsAmusingDetachedAmusedUtteranceLove PassionByronIrreverent
Author:W. H. Auden
Create image

“So long as man is capable of Prema, Dharma will exist, do not doubt it. When that Prema is fixed on the Lord, your mental make-up will slowly and steadily undergo a revolutionary change; then, man will share in the sorrows and joys of his fellow-beings; thereafter he contacts the very source of the Bliss that is beyond the temporary gains and losses of this world.”

MenWorldLongJoyLossLordDoubtShareThis WorldSourceSorrowCapableGainsFellowsContactRevolutionaryFixedBlissTemporaryDharmaRevolutionary ChangeGains And Losses
Author:Sathya Sai Baba
Create image

“Fear is not an emotion, it is a disease. It spreads from the leader to his followers and vice-versa. Nothing has killed more men in war than fear. What should a warrior fear? Death? But death is what everyone achieves ultimately. Is it wounds that you fear? What is more important? A pint of your blood or the nectar of victory? Think. Thinking will clear such doubts.”

ThinkingMenShouldImportantWarEmotionLeaderClearDoubtBloodAchieveVictoryDiseaseVicesSpreadWoundsWarriorFollowersFear Of DeathVice VersaPintsNectar
Author:Anand Neelakantan
Create image

“You know, the technology was at the right place for us to build this world. The most difficult thing about doing The Croods was no doubt the building of the world. Every single thing in this film is organic. Organic things are tough. Very very labour intensive. And we have no man-made structures. You could argue that everything in this film is really an exterior. Even the interiors of the cave are exteriors. So building this world was the biggest thing of all, and the technology was there to do it.”

KnowsMenWorldMadeFilmDifficultTechnologyDoubtThis WorldBuildingToughStructureArguingNo DoubtLabourInteriorsCavesRight PlaceDifficult ThingsExterior
Author:Chris Sanders
Create image