Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. quotes - page 5

Deep-seated preferences cannot be argued about - you cannot argue a man into liking a glass of beer - and therefore, when differences are sufficiently far reaching, we try to kill the other man rather than let him have his way. But that is perfectly consistent with admitting that, so far as appears, his grounds are just as good as ours. (Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.)
The interpretation of constitutional principles must not be too literal. We must remember that the machinery of government would not work if it were not allowed a little play in its joints. View quote
Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.
Philosophy may have gained by the attempts in recent years to look through the fiction to the fact and to generalize corporations, partnerships, and other groups into a single conception. But to generalize is to omit, and, in this instance, to omit one characteristic of the complete corporation, as called into being under modern statutes, that is most important in business and law. View quote
Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.
Gentlemen, to the lady without whom I should never have survived for eighty, nor sixty, nor yet thirty years. Her smile has been my lyric, her understanding, the rhythm of the stanza. She has been the spring wherefrom I have drawn the power to write the words. She is the poem of my life. View quote
Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.
As I grow older I grow calm. If I feel what are perhaps an old man's apprehensions, that competition from new races will cut deeper than working men's disputes and will test whether we can hang together or can fight. View quote
Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.
The question in every case is whether the words used are used in such circumstances and are of such a nature as to create a clear and present danger that they will bring about the substantive evils that Congress has a right to prevent. It is a question of proximity and degree. When a nation is at war many things that might be said in time of peace are such a hindrance to its effort that their utterance will not be endured so long as men fight and that no Court could regard them as protected by any constitutional right. View quote
Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.
When twenty years ago a vague terror went over the earth and the word socialism began to be heard, I thought and still think that fear was translated into doctrines that had no proper place in the Constitution or the common law. Judges are apt to be naif, simple-minded men, and they need something of Mephistopheles. We too need education in the obvious-to learn to transcend our own convictions and to leave room for much that we hold dear to be done away with short of revolution by the orderly change of law. View quote
Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.
If in the long run the beliefs expressed in proletarian dictatorship are destined to be accepted by the dominant forces of the community, the only meaning of free speech is that they should be given their chance and have their way. View quote
Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.
A man may fulfill the object of his existence by asking a question he cannot answer, and attempting a task he cannot achieve. View quote
Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.
A man is usually more careful of his money than of his principles. View quote
Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.
The language of judicial decision is mainly the language of logic. And the logical method and form flatter that longing for certainty and for repose which is in every human mind. But certainty generally is illusion, and repose is not the destiny of man. (Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.)
Insanity is often the logic of an accurate mind overtasked. View quote
Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.
Knowledge-it excites prejudices to call it science-is advancing as irresistibly, as majestically, as remorselessly as the ocean moves in upon the shore. View quote
Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.
The real religion of the world comes from women much more than from men - from mothers most of all, who carry the key of our souls in their bosoms. View quote
Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.
Thine eye was on the censer, And not the hand that bore it. View quote
Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.
There is that glorious epicurean paradox uttered by my friend the historian, in one of his flashing moments 'Give us the luxuries of life, and we will dispense with its necessaries.' To this must certainly be added that other saying of one of the wittiest of men 'Good Americans when they die go to Paris.' View quote
Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.
Good to the heels the well-worn slipper feels When the tired player shuffles off the buskin A page of Hood may do a fellow good After a scolding from Carlyle or Ruskin. View quote
Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.
Controversy equalizes fools and wise men - and the fools know it. View quote
Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.
A pun does not commonly justify a blow in return. But if a blow were given for such cause, and death ensued, the jury would be judges both of the facts and of the pun, and might, if the latter were of an aggravated character, return a verdict of justifiable homicide. View quote
Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.
Memory is a net: one that finds it full of fish when he takes it from the brook, but a dozen miles of water have run through it without sticking. View quote
Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.
When the last reader reads no more. (Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.)
And since, I never dare to write As funny as I can. View quote
Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.
God reigneth. All is well. View quote
Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.
If we are only as the potters clay Made to be fashioned as the artist wills, And broken into shards if we offend The eye of Him who made us, it is well. View quote
Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.
Everybody likes and respects self-made men. It is a great deal better to be made in that way than not to be made at all. View quote
Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.