Some of the most-shared quotes were never said by the people they are credited to. Here are the ones Wikiquote lists as misattributed, with what is known about where they really came from.
We rely on the notes and sources recorded on Wikiquote and show them next to each quote. “Misattributed” means the evidence points away from the credited person — it does not always tell us who did say it.
When you are at Rome, live as Romans live.
St. Ambrose, Si fueris Romæ, Romano vivito more as translated in Latin Proverbs and Quotations (1869) by Alfred Henderson; very commonly paraphrased as "When in Rome do as the Romans do". Read the full notes
William Temple, in "Heads Designed for an Essay on Conversation" in The Works of Sir William Temple, Bart. in Four Volumes (1757), Vol. III, p. 547 Read the full notes
An atheist is a man who has no invisible means of support.
Though Sheen is quoted as saying this in Look magazine (14 December 1955) the earliest located declaration of this witticism was by John Buchan, 1st Baron Tweedsmuir on 21 February 1936: "I have heard an atheist defined as a man who had no… Read the full notes
From Edward Payson in "Momentos of Rev. Edward Payson D.D., ed. Edwin L. Janes (New York: Nelson & Phillips, 1873), p. 87. The Original version reads: "... for if you should see a man shut up in a close room, idolizing a set of lamps, and… Read the full notes
Too much sanity may be madness and the maddest of all, to see life as it is and not as it should be.
This quote did not appear in Cervantes' Don Quixote, but instead a 1965 Broadway musical by Dale Wasserman titled Man of La Mancha, which was inspired by Don Quixote. Read the full notes
Your argument is sound, nothing but sound.
Anonymous quip quoted in an essay in Logic, an Introduction (1950) by Lionel Ruby. A Benjamin Franklin quote immediately follows, so this statement was misattributed to Franklin. Read the full notes
It's better to burn out than to fade away.
Quoted by Cobain in his suicide note, this is from the song My My, Hey Hey (Out of the Blue) by Neil Young, from his album Rust Never Sleeps (1979) Read the full notes
Circumstances rule men and not men circumstances.
Herodotus, Histories VII.49.3; misattributed to Euripides in "The Imperial Four" by Professor Creasy in Bentley's Miscellany Vol. 33 (January 1853), p. 22 Read the full notes
Perhaps one has to be very old before one learns to be amused rather than shocked.
Not Browning, but a misquotation from Pearl Buck's China, Past and Present: "Ah well, perhaps one has to be very old before one learns how to be amused rather than shocked". Read the full notes
Attributed to Leary by Terence McKenna in one of his talks ("The World and Its Double", 11 September 1993, Nature Friends Lodge, Sierra Madre, CA), though he also stated Leary denied ever having said it. Read the full notes
Never ascribe to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity.
Often known as Hanlon's razor, this was attributed to Napoleon without source in Message Passing Server Internals (2003) by Bill Blunden, p. 15, ISBN 0071416382 Read the full notes
Lost causes are the only ones worth fighting for.
This quote is from Ethel Lina White's The Wheel Spins (1936). It was popularized in the film Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939). In this film a similar line was spoken by "Jefferson Smith". Read the full notes
There's a sucker born every minute.
Commonly attributed to Barnum, there is much testimony of contemporaries that he never actually said this, and in "P. T. Barnum Never Did Say "There's a Sucker Born Every Minute" R. J. Brown asserts that it actually originated with a… Read the full notes
The human mind always makes progress, but it is a progress in spirals.
Probably a paraphrase of this line from De l’Allemagne, Pt. 3. ch. 10. "Goethe has made a remark upon the perfectability of the human mind, which is full of sagacity: It is always advancing, but in a spiral line." Not known from Goethe's… Read the full notes
No member of a crew is praised for the rugged individuality of his rowing.
Widely misattributed to Emerson on the Internet, this quote is actually taken from Alfred North Whitehead's essay "Harvard: The Future" (The Atlantic Monthly, September 1936.) Read the full notes
He has great tranquility of heart who cares neither for the praises nor the fault-finding of men.
Magnam habet cordis tranquillitatem, qui nec laudes curat, nec vituperia. — Thomas à Kempis, Imitation of Christ (ca. 1418), book II, ch. VI, paragraph 2 Read the full notes
No clear citations of this to Ben-Gurion have been located. A very early variant of this idea (which plays upon the statement of René Descartes "Cogito ergo sum" — "I think, therefore I exist") is found in Die Weimarer Reichsverfassung… Read the full notes
But what a perfection of rottenness in a philosophy!
William James, of Santayana's The Interpretations of Poetry and Religion (1900), in a letter to George H. Palmer (1900), as quoted in George Santayana : A Biography (2003) by John McCormick Read the full notes
Hate, it has caused a lot of problems in the world, but has not solved one yet.
Nearly identical quote attributed to a 1995 TV show, Touched by an Angel : Tess: No, hate has caused a lot of problems in this world, but it's never solved one yet. Read the full notes
What do you despise? By this you are truly known.
A few sites, perhaps most of them deriving their information from its previous placement among the "Attributed" quotes here, credit this to Michelangelo, but so far as definite citations go, it almost certainly originated with Frank… Read the full notes