Quote

The only absolute morality is absolute stagnation.

Samuel Butler

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Samuel Butler
Age: 66 †
Born: 1835
Born: December 4
Died: 1902
Died: June 18
Farmer
Novelist
Painter
Photographer
Poet
Science Fiction Writer
Translator
Writer
Notts
Cellarius
Stagnation
Absolutes
Absolute
Ethics
Morality

More quotes by Samuel Butler

Image
People are always good company when they are doing what they really enjoy.
Samuel Butler
Image
Fear is static that prevents me from hearing myself.
Samuel Butler
Image
When a man is in doubt about this or that in his writing, it will often guide him if he asks himself how it will tell a hundred years hence.
Samuel Butler
Image
They say the test of [literary power] is whether a man can write an inscription. I say, Can he name a kitten? And by this test I am condemned, for I cannot.
Samuel Butler
Image
I believe that he was really sorry that people would not believe he was sorry that he was not more sorry.
Samuel Butler
Image
The wish to spread those opinions that we hold conducive to our own welfare is so deeply rooted in the English character that few of us can escape its influence.
Samuel Butler
Image
Lying has a kind of respect and reverence with it. We pay a person the compliment of acknowledging his superiority whenever we lie to him.
Samuel Butler
Image
How often do we not see children ruined through the virtues, real or supposed, of their parents?
Samuel Butler
Image
Our minds want clothes as much as our bodies.
Samuel Butler
Image
Life is a quarry, out of which we are to mold and chisel and complete a character.
Samuel Butler
Image
Neither irony or sarcasm is argument.
Samuel Butler
Image
The seven deadly sins: Want of money, bad health, bad temper, chastity, family ties, knowing that you know things, and believing in the Christian religion.
Samuel Butler
Image
He dons are too busy educating the young men to be able to teach them anything.
Samuel Butler
Image
In law, nothing is certain but the expense.
Samuel Butler
Image
If people would dare to speak to one another unreservedly, there would be a good deal less sorrow in the world a hundred years hence.
Samuel Butler
Image
The human intellect owes its superiority over that of the lower animals in great measure to the stimulus which alcohol has given imagination.
Samuel Butler
Image
[P]oetry resembles metaphysics: one does not mind one's own, but one does not like anyone else's.
Samuel Butler
Image
The best liar is he who makes the smallest amount of lying go the longest way.
Samuel Butler
Image
God and the Devil are an effort after specialisation and division of labour.
Samuel Butler
Image
In practice it is seldom very hard to do one's duty when one knows what it is, but it is sometimes extremely difficult to find this out.
Samuel Butler