Semiotics

"The arrow belongs not to the archer when it has once left the bow; the word no longer belongs to the speaker when it has once passed his lips, especially when it has been multiplied by the press."

"We must judge of men's intentions by their acts, and not by expressions in letters, which are contrary to their acts."

"Words are transient, and vanish in the air as soon as spoken, and there can be no tenor of them . . . but when a thing is written, though every omission of a letter may not make a variance, yet, if such omission makes a word of another signification, it is fatal."

"He says one thing, but he does another; it seems to me to be common sense to look at what is done, and not to what is said."

"Qiue ad unumfinem loqunta sunt, non debent ad alium detorqueri: Those words which are spoken to one end, ought not to be perverted to another."

"Nay, gentlemen, do not quarrel about words."

"Most of the disputes in the world arise from words."

"Rather commend yourself by your actions, than your expressions; one good action is worth twenty good expressions."

"There is no magic in words."

"Words pass from men lightly."

"Ein Wörtlein kann ihn fällen."

"Three sleepless nights I passed in sounding on, Through words and things, a dim and perilous way."

"The words are like Jack in a Box, and nobody knows what to make of them."

"Fair words enough a man shall find, They be good cheap: they cost right nought, Their substance is but only wind."

"I said, I will take heed to my ways, that I sin not with my tongue; I will keep my mouth with a bridle, while the wicked is before me."

"Speaking words of endearment where words of comfort availed not."

"My words are little jars For you to take and put upon a shelf. Their shapes are quaint and beautiful, And they have many pleasant colours and lustres To recommend them. Also the scent from them fills the room With sweetness of flowers and crushed grasses."

"There comes Emerson first, whose rich words, every one, Are like gold nails in temples to hang trophies on."

"Is not the Judge bound to know the meaning of all words in the English language; or if they are used technically or scientifically, to inform his own mind by evidence, and then to determine the meaning?"

"One tells as few lies as possible only by telling as few lies as possible, and not by having the least possible opportunity to do so."

"By a lie a man throws away and, as it were, annihilates his dignity as a man. A man who himself does not believe what he tells another […] has even less worth than if he were a mere thing […] makes himself a mere deceptive appearance of man, not man himself."

"Education has paralleled the life of prospering white America: it has been characterized by reverence for efficiency, cultivation of competence unattended by concern for aim, big white lies, and the mainly successful blackout of Black life."

"His supposed mythomania [of Diego Rivera] is in direct relation to his tremendous imagination. That is to say, he is as much of a liar as the poets or as the children who have not yet been turned into idiots by school or mothers. I have heard him tell all kinds of lies: from the most innocent, to the most complicated stories about people whom his imagination combined in a fantastic situation or actions, always with a great sense of humor and a marvelous critical sense; but I have never heard him say a single stupid or banal lie. Lying, or playing at lying, he unmasks many people, he learns the interior mechanism of others, who are much more ingenuously liars than he, and the most curious thing about the supposed lies of Diego, is that in the long and short of it, those who are involved in the imaginary combination become angry, not because of the lie, but because of the truth contained in the lie, that always comes to the surface."

"Children and fooles can not ly."

"Trump undermines the free press because he wants to be the only legitimate source of information in society. He lies all the time to break down the processes by which we discern the truth about the world around us, and compile the observations and facts which make up the tapestry of reality. He has exposed the paper-thin vulnerability of our democratic society, which depends mightily on observing social norms—like yielding to shame—and a shared acceptance of some common set of truths.The American president is determined to bulldoze this architecture of social structures, and usher in an era where force, not deliberation and cooperation, determines the path our society will take. If he never acknowledges any truth besides his own, he never has to do anything outside his own direct interests. He does not have to actually respond to any kind of criticism, or ever reconsider his course of action. Relentless lying, after all, is a form of coercion, in which you bend others to your will by forcing them to accept the infrastructure of your false reality—or to give up caring whether anything is true or false in the first place. Don't believe your eyes and ears. Everybody was cheering for me."

"Drummond: All shine, and no substance! Bert, whenever you see something bright, shining, perfect-seeming—all gold, with purple spots—look behind the paint! And if it’s a lie—show it up for what it really is!"

"You are of your father the devil, and your will is to do your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks out of his own character, for he is a liar and the father of lies."

"I always divide people into two groups. Those who live by what they know to be a lie, and those who live by what they believe, falsely, to be the truth."

"We discovered there were some Eastern Europeans who could defeat the polygraph at any time. Americans are not very good at it, because we are raised to tell the truth and when we lie it is easy to tell we are lying. But we find a lot of Europeans and Asiatics can handle that polygraph without a blip, and you know they are lying and you have evidence that they are lying."

"As we all know, the most effective lies are the ones sprinkled with the most actual truths."

"Half the world knows not how the other half lies."

"It is not a lie to keep the truth to oneself."

"Show me a liar, and I will show thee a thief."

"A lie is no less a lie because it is a thousand years old."

"Can you hear them? They talk about us, telling lies. Well, that's no surprise."

"Beyond a doubt truth bears the same relation to falsehood as light to darkness; and this truth is in itself so excellent that, even when it dwells on humble and lowly matters, it is still infinitely above uncertainty and lies, disguised in high and lofty discourses; because in our minds, even if lying should be their fifth element, this does not prevent that the truth of things is the chief nutriment of superior intellects, though not of wandering wits. But you who live in dreams are better pleased by the sophistical reasons and frauds of wits in great and uncertain things, than by those reasons which are certain and natural and not so far above us."

"Fire is to represent truth because it destroys all sophistry and lies; and the mask is for lying and falsehood which conceal truth."

"To lie is so vile, that even if it were in speaking well of godly things it would take off something from God's grace; and Truth is so excellent, that if it praises but small things they become noble."

"Ideas have consequences, and so do lies."

"A small lie needs a bodyguard of bigger lies to protect it."

"All full of lies."

"Lying is such a central characteristic of life that better understanding of it is relevant to almost all human affairs. Some might shudder at that statement, because they view lying as reprehensible."

"Mankind are not held together by lies. Trust is the foundation of society. Where there is no truth, there can be no trust, and where there is no trust, there can be no society. Where there is society, there is trust, and where there is trust, there is something upon which it is supported."

"Quoth Hudibras, I smell a rat; Ralpho, thou dost prevaricate."

"And, after all, what is a lie? 'Tis but The truth in masquerade."

"Resolved to die in the last dyke of prevarication."

"I tell him, if a clergyman, he lies! If captains the remark, or critics, make, Why they lie also—under a mistake."

"Lying is the same as alcoholism. Liars prevaricate even on their deathbeds."

"What I have termed micro expressions, very fast facial movements lasting less than one-fifth of a second, are one important source of leakage, revealing an emotion a person is trying to conceal. A false expression can be betrayed in a number of ways: it is usually very slightly asymmetrical, and it lacks smoothness in the way it flows on and off the face."

"Having abandoned false speech, the recluse Gotama abstains from falsehood. He speaks only the truth, he lives devoted to truth; trustworthy and reliable, he does not deceive anyone in the world."