“I'm living so far beyond my means that we may almost be said to be living apart.”

“I think oysters are more beautiful than any religion,' he resumed presently. 'They not only forgive our unkindness to them; they justify it, they incite us to go on being perfectly horrid to them. ...”

“This story has no moral. If it points out an evil at any rate it suggests no remedy.”

“Do one thing for me, Sredni Vashtar.”

“Well in those parts (upcountry India) they have were-tigers, or think they have, and I must say that in this case, so far as sworn and uncontested evidence went, they had every ground for thinking ...”

“Confront a child, a puppy, and a kitten with a sudden danger; the child will turn instinctively for assistance, the puppy will grovel in abject submission, the kitten will brace its tiny body for a...”

“There is beauty in truth, even if it's painful. Those who lie, twist life so that it looks tasty to the lazy, brilliant to the ignorant, and powerful to the weak. But lies only strengthen our defec...”

“One lie has the power to tarnish a thousand truths.”

“Don't lies eventually lead to the truth? And don't all my stories, true or false, tend toward the same conclusion? Don't they all have the same meaning? So what does it matter whether they are true...”

“People think that a liar gains a victory over his victim. What Ive learned is that a lie is an act of self-abdication, because one surrenders ones reality to the person to whom one lies, making tha...”

“Before you enbark on a journey of revenge, dig two graves.”

“Maybe I could dole out the truth in tiny pieces that, once assembled, would make a picture that resembled a reality in which I hadnt done anything wrong.”