We may argue eloquently that "honesty is the best policy." Unfortunately, the moment honesty is adopted for the sake of policy it mysteriously ceases to be honesty.

—Dorothy L. Sayers

About Dorothy L. Sayers

Portrait of Dorothy L. Sayers

Dorothy Leigh Sayers ( SAIRZ; 13 June 1893 – 17 December 1957) was an English crime novelist, playwright, translator and critic.

More quotations from Dorothy L. Sayers

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

—Dorothy L. Sayers

Unless we do change our whole way of thought about work, I do not think we shall ever escape from the appalling squirrel-cage of economic confusion in which we have been madly turning for the last three centuries or so, the cage in which we landed ourselves by acquiescing in a social system based upon envy and avarice.

—Dorothy L. Sayers

economics work envy avarice

The worst sin—perhaps the only sin—passion can commit, is to be joyless.

—Dorothy L. Sayers

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.

—Dorothy L. Sayers

Never think that wars are irrational catastrophes: they happen when wrong ways of thinking and living bring about intolerable situations.… The root causes of conflict are usually to be found in some wrong way of life in which all parties have acquiesced, and for which everybody must, to some extent, bear the blame.

—Dorothy L. Sayers

More quotations tagged with “honesty”

I am still looking for the modern equivalent of those Quakers who ran successful businesses, made money because they offered honest products and treated their people decently, worked hard, spent honestly, saved honestly, gave honest value for money, put back more than they took out, and told no lies. This business creed, sadly, seems long forgotten.

—Anita Roddick

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Ninety-eight percent of the adults in this country are decent, hard-working, honest Americans. It's the other lousy two percent that get all the publicity. But then—we elected them.

honesty politics cynicism USA hard work elections adults

If you look at history, even recent history, you see that there is indeed progress.… Over time, the cycle is clearly, generally upwards. And it doesn't happen by laws of nature. And it doesn't happen by social laws.… It happens as a result of hard work by dedicated people who are willing to look at problems honestly, to look at them without illusions, and to go to work chipping away at them, with no guarantee of success—in fact, with a need for a rather high tolerance for failure along the way, and plenty of disappointments.

—Noam Chomsky

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Barring that natural expression of villainy which we all have, the man looked honest enough.

honesty perception appearance

If you do not tell the truth about yourself you cannot tell it about other people.

—Virginia Woolf

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History

20 Dec 2014 Added