My way of joking is to tell the truth. It is the funniest joke in the world.
- Topic: Power, Truth
- Photo: Jeffrey Benjamin
More Quotes from George Bernard Shaw
A pessimist is a man who thinks everybody is as nasty as himself, and hates them for it.
Religion is a great force—the only real motive force in the world; but what you fellows don't understand is that you must get a man through his own religion and not through yours.
A life spent making mistakes is not only more honorable, but more useful than a life spent doing nothing.
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The desire of power in excess caused the angels to fall; the desire of knowledge in excess caused man to fall.
Self-respect leads to self-discipline. When you have both firmly under your belt, that's real power.
There is only one time that is important—now! It is the most important time because it is the only time when we have any power.
Anyone who has the power to make you believe absurdities has the power to make you commit injustices.
Conceit spoils the finest genius… and the great charm of all power is modesty.
Next to the assumption of power is the responsibility of relinquishing it.
Put yourself in a state of mind where you say to yourself, "Here is an opportunity for me to celebrate like never before, my own power, my own ability to get myself to do whatever is necessary.
Never complain of that of which it is at all times in your power to rid yourself.
And if all others accepted the lie which the Party imposed—if all records told the same tale—then the lie passed into history and became truth.
For truth is precious and divine—too rich a perl for carnal swine.
For truth itself does not have the privilege to be employed at any time and in every way; its use, noble as it is, has its circumscriptions and limits.
When you want to help people, you tell them the truth. When you want to help yourself, you tell them what they want to hear.
I hope you have not been leading a double life, pretending to be wicked and being good all the time. That would be hypocrisy.
Political language is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable.
To offend a strong man, tell him a lie. To offend a weak man, tell him the truth.
However much you deny the truth, the truth goes on existing.
Only when we realize that there is no eternal, unchanging truth or absolute truth can we arouse in ourselves a sense of intellectual responsibility.
