Quotes by Dorothy L. Sayers

“In the world it is called Tolerance, but in hell it is called Despair, the sin that believes in nothing, cares for nothing, seeks to know nothing, interferes with nothing, enjoys nothing, hates nothing, finds purpose in nothing, lives for nothing, and remains alive because there is nothing for which it will die.”

“The only sin passion can commit is to be joyless.”

“None of us feels the true love of God till we realize how wicked we are. But you cant teach people that -- they have to learn by experience.”

“As I grow older and older, And totter toward the tomb, I find that I care less and less, Who goes to bed with whom.”

“The great advantage about telling the truth is that nobody ever believes it.”

“The first thing a principle does is kill somebody”

“Time and trouble will tame an advanced young woman, but an advanced old woman is uncontrollable by any earthly force.”

“She always says, my lord, that facts are like cows. If you look them in the face hard enough they generally run away.”

“Lawyers enjoy a little mystery, you know. Why, if everybody came forward and told the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth straight out, we should all retire to the workhouse.”

“Except ye become as little children, except you can wake on your fiftieth birthday with the same forward-looking excitement and interest in life that you enjoyed when you were five, ye cannot enter the kingdom of God. One must not only die daily, but every day we must be born again.”

“I admit it is better fun to punt than be punted, and that a desire to have all the fun is nine-tenths of the law of chivalry.”

“a nice old duck really, when you know her!”

“Very dangerous things, theories.”

“There certainly does seem a possibility that the detective story will come to an end, simply because the public will have learnt all the tricks.”

“Books . . . are like lobster shells, we surround ourselves with em, then we grow out of em and leave em behind, as evidence of our earlier stages of development.”

“Every time a man expects, as he says, his money to work for him, he is expecting other people to work for him.”

“If it were not for the war, this war would suit me down to the ground.”

Facts are like cows. If you look them in the face long enough, they generally run away.

If it ever occurs to people to value the honour of the mind equally with the honour of the body, we shall get a social revolution of a quite unparalleled sort.

The only ethical principle which has made science possible is that the truth shall be told all the time. If we do not penalize false statements made in error, we open up the way for false statements by intention. And a false statement of fact, made deliberately, is the most serious crime a scientist can commit.