Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. quotes

Have the courage to act instead of react. (Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.)
What a blessed thing it is, that Nature, when she invented, manufactured, and patented her authors, contrived to make critics out of the chips that were left!
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
The sound of a kiss is not so loud as that of a cannon, but its echo lasts a great deal longer.
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
Put not your trust in money, but put your money in trust.
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
I find the great thing in this world is not so much where we stand, as in what direction we are moving: To reach the port of heaven, we must sail sometimes with the wind and sometimes against it,-but we must sail, and not drift, nor lie at anchor.
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
Memory is a net; one finds it full of fish when he takes it from the brook; but a dozen miles of water have run through it without sticking.
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
To reach a port we must sail, sometimes with the wind, and sometimes against it. But we must not drift or lie at anchor.
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
To be seventy years young is sometimes far more cheerful and hopeful than to be forty years old.
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
It is the province of knowledge to speak, and it is the privilege of wisdom to listen.
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
Speak clearly, if you speak at all; carve every word before you let it fall.
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
The world's great men have not commonly been great scholars, nor its great scholars great men. (Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.)
Truth is tough. It will not break, like a bubble, at a touch; nay, you may kick it about all day like a football, and it will be round and full at evening.
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
Without wearing any mask we are conscious of, we have a special face for each friend.
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
A few can touch the magic string, and noisy fame is proud to win them: Alas for those that never sing, but die with all their music in them!
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
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.
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
The very aim and end of our institutions is just this: that we may think what we like and say what we think.
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
I like children; I like 'em, and I respect 'em. Pretty much all the honest truth-telling there is in the world is done by them.
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
The man who is always worrying about whether or not his soul would be damned generally has a soul that isn't worth a damn.
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
Every library should try to be complete on something, if it were only the history of pinheads.
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
There is no friend like an old friend who has shared our morning days, no greeting like his welcome, no homage like his praise.
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
Many people die with their music still in them. Why is this so? Too often it is because they are always getting ready to live. Before they know it, time runs out. (Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.)
Sin has many tools, but a lie is the handle which fits them all.
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
Language is the blood of the soul into which thoughts run and out of which they grow.
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
Love prefers twilight to daylight.
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
Insanity is often the logic of an accurate mind overtasked.
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.