Quote

Now, the essence, the very spirit of Christmas is that we first make believe a thing is so, and lo, it presently turns out to be so.

Stephen Leacock

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Stephen Leacock
Age: 74 †
Born: 1869
Born: December 30
Died: 1944
Died: March 28
Economist
Humorist
Political Scientist
Writer
Hants
Stephen Butler Leacock
Thing
Transcendentalism
Believe
Presently
Make
Christmas
Essence
Turns
Spirit
Firsts
First

More quotes by Stephen Leacock

Image
Humour in its highest reach mingles with pathos: it voices sorrow for our human lot and reconciliation with it.
Stephen Leacock
Image
Men are able to trust one another, knowing the exact degree of dishonesty they are entitled to expect.
Stephen Leacock
Image
Hockey captures the essence of Canadian experience in the New World. In a land so inescapably and inhospitably cold, hockey is the chance of life, and an affirmation that despite the deathly chill of winter we are alive.
Stephen Leacock
Image
Humor may be defined as the kindly contemplation of the incongruities of life, and the artistic expression thereof.
Stephen Leacock
Image
My parents migrated to Canada in 1876, and I decided to go with them.
Stephen Leacock
Image
The minute a man is convinced he is interesting, he isn't.
Stephen Leacock
Image
The Victorians needed parody. Without it their literature would have been a rank and weedy growth, over-watered with tears.
Stephen Leacock
Image
In earlier times they had no statistics and so they had to fall back on lies. Hence the huge exaggerations of primitive literature, giants, miracles, wonders! It's the size that counts. They did it with lies and we do it with statistics: but it's all the same.
Stephen Leacock
Image
Chess is one long regret.
Stephen Leacock
Image
I've seen lifelong friends drift apart over golf just because one could play better, but the other counted better.
Stephen Leacock
Image
In ancient times they had no statistics so they had to fall back on lies.
Stephen Leacock
Image
About the only good thing you can say about old age is, it's better than being dead!
Stephen Leacock
Image
The great man... walks across his century and leaves the marks of his feet all over it, ripping out the dates on his goloshes as he passes.
Stephen Leacock
Image
A lone maple leaf resting on sand Have you ever been out for a late autumn walk in the closing part of the afternoon, and suddenly looked up to realize that the leaves have practically all gone? And the sun has set and the day gone before you knew it, and with that a cold wind blows across the landscape? That's retirement.
Stephen Leacock
Image
It may be those who do most, dream most.
Stephen Leacock
Image
Being a specialist is one thing, getting a job is another.
Stephen Leacock
Image
Too much has been said of the heroes of history-the strong men, the troublesome men too little of the amiable, the kindly, the tolerant.
Stephen Leacock
Image
There is an old motto that runs, If at first you don't succeed, try, try again. This is nonsense. It ought to read, If at first you don't succeed, quit, quit at once.
Stephen Leacock
Image
It is difficult to be funny and great at the same time. Aristophanes and Moliere and Mark Twain must sit below Aristotle and Bossuet and Emerson.
Stephen Leacock
Image
Anybody who has listened to certain kinds of music, or read certain kinds of poetry, or heard certain kinds of performances on the concertina, will admit that even suicide has its brighter aspects.
Stephen Leacock