Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. Quotes

Quotes about:

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  A mind that is stretched by a new experience can never go back to its old dimensions.

  Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

  Inspirational, Wise, Travel

  159 Copy quote

• The mark of a civilized man is his willingness to re-examine his most cherished beliefs.

  Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

  Men, Belief, Mark

  15 Copy quote

• My right to swing my fist ends where your nose begins.

  Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

  Swings, Noses, Fists

  91 Copy quote

• The greatest act of faith is when a man understands he is not God.

  Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

  Faith, Humility, Men

  23 Copy quote

• Success. Is not the position where you are standing, but which direction you are going.

  Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

  Insperational, Where You Are, Position

  103 Copy quote

• This is a court of law, not a court of justice.

  Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

  Law, Justice, Court

  94 Copy quote

• Young men know the rules, but old men know the exceptions.

  Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

  Men, Young, Old Man

  13 Copy quote

• Even a dog distinguishes between being stumbled over and being kicked.

  Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

  Dog

  The Common Law Lecture 1 (1881)

  28 Copy quote

• Certitude leads to violence. This is a proposition that has an easy application and a difficult one. The easy application is to ideoologues, dogmatists, and bullies--people who think that their rigtness justifies them in imposing on anyone who does not happen to suscribe to their particular ideology, dogma or notion of turf. If the conviction of rightness is powerful enough, resistance to it will be met, sooner or later by force. There are people like this in every sphere of life, and it is natural to feel that the world would be a better place without them!

  Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

  Powerful, Thinking, People

  116 Copy quote

• 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, Jr.

  Motivational, Lying, Moving

  "Personal Quotes/ Biography". www.imdb.com.

  25 Copy quote

• If there is any principle of the Constitution that more imperatively calls for attachment than any other it is the principle of free thought, not free thought for those who agree with us but freedom for the thought that we hate.

  Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

  Freedom, Hate, Attachment

  United States v. Schwimmer (dissenting opinion) (1929)

  86 Copy quote

• I like to pay taxes. With them, I buy civilization.

  Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

  Civilization, Paying Taxes, Taxation

  "If we want a civilised society, charities can't fill the void left by government" by Debbie Chachra, www.theguardian.com. October 8, 2013.

  87 Copy quote

• The history of intellectual growth and discovery clearly demonstrates the need for unfettered freedom, the right to think the unthinkable, discuss the unmentionable, and challenge the unchallengeable. To curtail free expression strikes twice at intellectual freedom, for whoever deprives another of the right to state unpopular views necessarily also deprives others of the right to listen to those views.

  Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

  Thinking, Discovery, Views

  15 Copy quote

• The noblest service comes from nameless hands; and the best servant does his work unseen.

  Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

  Hands, Effort, Unseen

  11 Copy quote

• The man of action has the present, but the thinker controls the future.

  Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

  Men, Action, Thinker

  "The essential Holmes". Book by Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr., 1992.

  33 Copy quote

• Lawyers spend their professional careers shoveling smoke.

  Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

  Funny, Lawyer, Deals

  Attributed to Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., in "Watergate and the White House" by Edward W. Knappman, p. 100, 1973.

  10 Copy quote

• A word is not a crystal, transparent and unchanged; it is the skin of a living thought and may vary greatly in color and content according to the circumstances and time in which it is used.

  Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

  Life, Color, Skins

  Towne v. Eisner (1918)

  13 Copy quote

• If you don't know what you want, you will probably never get it.

  Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

  Glowing, Going With The Flow, Want

  19 Copy quote

• Every calling is great when greatly pursued.

  Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

  God, Spiritual, Life And Love

  15 Copy quote

• Every real thought on every real subject knocks the wind out of somebody or other.

  Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

  Real, Thinking, Wind

  5 Copy quote

• The life of the law has not been logic; it has been experience.

  Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

  Life, Law, Logic

  The Common Law Lecture 1 (1881).

  70 Copy quote

• Life is painting a picture, not doing a sum.

  Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

  Life, Art, Pain

  "The Class of '61" (speech), Cambridge, Mass., 28 June 1911

  21 Copy quote

• Society is always trying in some way to grind us down to a single flat surface.

  Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

  Always Trying, Society, Grind

  6 Copy quote

• Many ideas grow better when transplanted into another mind than in the one where they sprung up.

  Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

  Inspiring, Teamwork, Motivation

  8 Copy quote

• Taxes are the price we pay for a civilized society.

  Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

  Paying Taxes, Civilized Society, Pay

  "Compania General De Tabacos De Filipinas v. Collector of Internal Revenue, 275 U.S. 87, 100". Dissenting opinion, November 21, 1927.

  19 Copy quote

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