Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
I have wrought my simple plan If I give one hour of joy To the boy who’s half a man, Or the man who’s half a boy.
'There's no need for fiction in medicine,' remarks Foster... 'for the facts will always beat anything you fancy.'
There is a mystery about this which stimulates the imagination; where there is no imagination there is no horror.
The larger crimes are apt to be the simpler, for the bigger the crime, the more obvious, as a rule, is the motive.
[Sherlock Holmes:] The temptation to form premature theories upon insufficient data is the bane of our profession.
An absence of antecedents and of relatives is sometimes an aid rather than an impediment to social advancement . . .
I am afraid that I rather give myself away when I explain," said he. "Results without causes are much more impressive.
If in 100 years I am only known as the man who invented Sherlock Holmes then I will have considered my life a failure.
A fine horse or a beautiful woman, I cannot look at them unmoved, even now when seventy winters have chilled my blood.
There seems to me to be absolutely no limit to the inanity and credulity of the human race. Homo Sapiens! Homo idioticus!
My life is spent in one long effort to escape from the commonplaces of existence. These little problems help me to do so.
A man always finds it hard to realize that he may have finally lost a woman's love, however badly he may have treated her.
A fine thought in fine language is a most precious jewel, and should not be hid away, but be exposed for use and ornament.
Just see how it glints and sparkles. Of course it is a nucleus and focus of crime. Every good stone is. They are the devil
I think there are certain crimes which the law cannot touch, and which therefore, to some extent, justify private revenge.
Circumstantial evidence is occasionally very convincing, as when you find a trout in the milk, to quote Thoreau's example.
Still, it is an error to argue in front of your data. You find yourself insensibly twisting them round to fit your theories.
Have you tried to drive a harpoon through a body? No? Tut, tut, my dear sir, you must really pay attention to these details.
The ways of fate are indeed hard to understand. If there is not some compensation hereafter, then the world is a cruel jest.
But love is an emotional thing, and whatever is emotional is opposed to that true cold reason which I place above all things.
The good Watson had at that time deserted me for a wife, the only selfish action I can recall in our association. I was alone.
What you do in this world is a matter of no consequence. The question is, what can you make people believe that you have done?
It is an old maxim of mine that when you have excluded the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.
Well, sir, let us do what we can to curtail this visit, which can hardly be agreeable to you, and is inexpressibly irksome to me.
There are times, young fellah, when every one of us must make a stand for human right and justice, or you never feel clean again.
I consider that a man's brain originally is like a little empty attic, and you have to stock it with such furniture as you choose.
Everything comes in circles. [...] The old wheel turns, and the same spoke comes up. It's all been done before, and will be again.
Like all Holmes' reasoning, the thing seemed simplicity itself when it was once explained. Dr. Watson, speaking of Sherlock Holmes.
How often have I said to you that when you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth?
I have seen too much not to know that the impression of a woman may be more valuable than the conclusion of an analytical reasoner.
The lowest and vilest alleys of London do not present a more dreadful record of sin than does the smiling and beautiful countryside.
I know, my dear Watson, that you share my love of all that is bizarre and outside the conventions and humdrum routine of daily life.
You never tire of the moor. You cannot think the wonderful secrets which it contains. It is so vast, and so barren, and so mysterious.
My sister and I, you will recollect, were twins, and you know how subtle are the links which bind two souls which are so closely allied.
From a drop of water a logician could infer the possibility of an Atlantic or a Niagara without having seen or heard of one or the other.
No man lives or has ever lived who has brought the same amount of study and of natural talent to the detection of crime which I have done.
Brothers are a blessing for one thing. There is no possibility of any young lady getting unreasonably conceited if she be endowed with them.
You wish to put me in the dark. I tell you that I will never be put in the dark. You wish to beat me. I tell you that you will never beat me.
I had ... come to an entirely erroneous conclusion, which shows, my dear Watson, how dangerous it always is to reason from insufficient data.
When you have one of the first brains of Europe up against you, and all the powers of darkness at his back, there are infinite possibilities.
'It is my duty to warn you that it will be used against you,' cried the Inspector, with the magnificent fair play of the British criminal law.
There is no satisfaction in vengeance unless the offender has time to realize who it is that strikes him, and why retribution has come upon him.
If my future were black, it was better surely to face it like a man than to attempt to brighten it by mere will-o’-the-wisps of the imagination.
Draw your chair up, and hand me my violin, for the only problem which we have still to solve is how to while away these bleak autumnal evenings.
For strange effects and extraordinary combinations we must go to life itself, which is always far more daring than any effort of the imagination.
It is of the highest importance in the art of detection to be able to recognise out of a number of facts which are incidental and which are vital.
I can never bring you to realize the importance of sleeves, the suggestiveness of thumb-nails, or the great issues that may hang from a boot-lace.
It is a capital mistake to theorize before one has data. Insensibly one begins to twist facts to suit theories, instead of theories to suit facts.
How sweet the morning air is! ...How small we feel with our petty ambitions and strivings in the presence of the great elemental forces of Nature!
Why should people ever take credit for charity when they must know that they cannot gain as much pleasure out of their guineas in any other fashion?