George Bernard Shaw Quotes

The play was a great success, but audience was a dismal failure.

After all, the wrong road always leads somewhere.

Hatred is the coward's revenge for being intimidated.

The man who writes about himself and his own time is the only man who writes about all people and all time.

Both optimists and pessimists contribute to society. The optimist invents the aeroplane, the pessimist the parachute.

Better keep yourself clean and bright; you are the window through which you must see the world.

You don't stop laughing when you grow old, you grow old when you stop laughing.

The fact that a believer is happier than a skeptic is no more to the point than the fact that a drunken man is happier than a sober one. The happiness of credulity is a cheap and dangerous quality of happiness, and by no means a necessity of life.

When a thing is funny, search it carefully for a hidden truth.

When a man wants to murder a tiger he calls it sport; when a tiger wants to murder him he calls it ferocity.

All great truths begin as blasphemies.

Liberty means responsibility. That is why most men dread it.

The only man I know who behaves sensibly is my tailor; he takes my measurements anew each time he sees me. The rest go on with their old measurements and expect me to fit them.

Without art, the crudeness of reality would make the world unbearable.

This is the true joy in life, the being used for a purpose recognized by yourself as a mighty one; the being thoroughly worn out before you are thrown on the scrap heap; the being a force of Nature instead of a feverish selfish little clod of ailments and grievances complaining that the world will not devote itself to making you happy.

Life does not cease to be funny when people die any more than it ceases to be serious when people laugh.

The trouble with her is that she lacks the power of conversation but not the power of speech.

What you are to do without me I cannot imagine.

The most tragic thing in the world is a man of genius who is not a man of honor.

Power does not corrupt men; fools, however, if they get into a position of power, corrupt power.

Criminals do not die by the hands of the law. They die by the hands of other men.

When a stupid man is doing something he is ashamed of, he always declares that it is his duty.

The thought of two thousand people crunching celery at the same time horrified me.

Imagination is the beginning of creation. You imagine what you desire, you will what you imagine and at last you create what you will.

A government which robs Peter to pay Paul can always depend on the support of Paul.

Censorship ends in logical completeness when nobody is allowed to read any books except the books that nobody can read.

We learn from experience that men never learn anything from experience.

A photographer is like a cod, which produces a million eggs in order that one may reach maturity.

He who can, does. He who cannot, teaches.

The power of accurate observation is commonly called cynicism by those who have not got it

I have very carefully studied Islam and the life of its Prophet (PBUH). I have done so both as a student of history and as a critic. And I have come to conclusion that Muhammad (PBUH) was indeed a great man and a deliverer and benefactor of mankind which was till then writhing under the most agonising Pain.

Progress is impossible without change; and those who cannot change their minds cannot change anything.

Doing what needs to be done may not make you happy, but it will make you great.

Do not do unto others as you would that they should do unto you. Their tastes may not be the same.

Life is no brief candle to me. It is a sort of splendid torch which I have got a hold of for the moment, and I want to make it burn as brightly as possible before handing it on to future generations.

You'll never have a quiet world till you knock the patriotism out of the human race.

When you loved me I gave you the whole sun and stars to play with. I gave you eternity in a single moment, strength of the mountains in one clasp of your arms, and the volume of all the seas in one impulse of your soul.

The difference between a lady and a flower girl is not how she behaves, but how she’s treated.

No man ever believes that the Bible means what it says: He is always convinced that it says what he means.

While we ourselves are the living graves of murdered beasts, how can we expect any ideal conditions on this earth?

As long as I have a want, I have a reason for living. Satisfaction is death.

Do not waste your time on Social Questions. What is the matter with the poor is Poverty what is the matter with the rich is Uselessness.

I never resist temptation because I have found that things that are bad for me do not tempt me.

First love is only a little foolishness and a lot of curiosity.

Reading made Don Quixote a gentleman. Believing what he read made him mad.

You have learnt something. That always feels at first as if you have lost something.

If you can’t appreciate what you’ve got, you’d better get what you can appreciate.

Democracy is a device that ensures we shall be governed no better than we deserve.

Life isn't about finding yourself. Life is about creating yourself.

A life spent making mistakes is not only more honorable, but more useful than a life spent doing nothing.

Make it a rule never to give a child a book you would not read yourself.

You see things; you say, 'Why?' But I dream things that never were; and I say 'Why not?

If you want to tell people the truth, make them laugh, otherwise they'll kill you.

Animals are my friends...and I don't eat my friends.

The reasonable man adapts himself to the world: the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man.

Those who cannot change their minds cannot change anything.

Youth is wasted on the young.

There are two tragedies in life. One is to lose your heart's desire. The other is to gain it.

If you cannot get rid of the family skeleton, you may as well make it dance.

There is no love sincerer than the love of food.

When two people are under the influence of the most violent, most insane, most delusive, and most transient of passions, they are required to swear that they will remain in that excited, abnormal, and exhausting condition continuously until death do them part.

People are always blaming their circumstances for what they are. I don't believe in circumstances. The people who get on in this world are the people who get up and look for the circumstances they want, and if they can't find them, make them.

Happy is the man who can make a living by his hobby

Beware of false knowledge; it is more dangerous than ignorance.

The liar's punishment is, not in the least that he is not believed, but that he cannot believe anyone else.

Why should we take advice on sex from the pope? If he knows anything about it, he shouldn't!

Never wrestle with pigs. You both get dirty and the pig likes it.

The single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has taken place.

I am enclosing two tickets to the first night of my new play; bring a friend ... if you have one.

Cannot possibly attend first night; will attend second, if there is one.

Success does not consist in never making mistakes but in never making the same one a second time.

A Native American elder once described his own inner struggles in this manner: Inside of me there are two dogs. One of the dogs is mean and evil. The other dog is good. The mean dog fights the good dog all the time. When asked which dog wins, he reflected for a moment and replied, The one I feed the most.

A pessimist is a man who thinks everybody is as nasty as himself, and hates them for it.

My way of joking is to tell the truth. It's the funniest joke in the world.

You use a glass mirror to see your face; you use works of art to see your soul.

Patriotism is, fundamentally, a conviction that a particular country is the best in the world because you were born in it....

Dancing is a perpendicular expression of a horizontal desire.

He knows nothing; and he thinks he knows everything. That points clearly to a political career.

If you have an apple and I have an apple and we exchange these apples then you and I will still each have one apple. But if you have an idea and I have an idea and we exchange these ideas, then each of us will have two ideas.

The longer I live, the more I realize that I am never wrong about anything, and that all the pains I have so humbly taken to verify my notions have only wasted my time!

There is always danger for those who are afraid.

You are going to let the fear of poverty govern your life and your reward will be that you will eat, but you will not live.