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.
A vote for Obama is a vote for the death of Israel.
Though Wurzelbacher agreed with a statement first made to him by an elderly audience member during a press appearance: "A vote for Obama is a vote for the death to Israel, I'll guarantee you that." He did not actually say it himself, but… Read the full notes
Let some people get rich first.
"Nanxun" (Southern Tour) of 1992. Quoted in The Economist (31 May 2001). A summarization of several quotations from Deng Xiaoping, known in Chinese as, "让一部分人先富起来", News of the Communist Party of China World Development Report 2009 The… Read the full notes
If moderation is a fault, then indifference is a crime.
Not a Kerouac quote, but by Georg Christoph Lichtenberg (1742-1799), the German scientist, satirist, and Anglophile: https://www.quotes.net/quote/58450 Read the full notes
Probably based on the quotation opening Chapter 1: "Marxism and feminism are one, and that one is Marxism." — Heidi Hartmann and Amy Bridges, "The Unhappy Marriage of Marxism and Feminism" Read the full notes
Heaven ne'er helps the men who will not act.
Anonymous verse mistakenly attached to Sophocles' frg. 308 TrGF (Iphigenia) due to a confusion in Stobaeus, Anthology, III.30.6 (S. Radt 1999:272; 2007:148). Read the full notes
"A billion here, a billion there, and pretty soon you're talking real money."
. Dirksen occasionally used the phrase "a billion here, a billion there" in his speeches, but the latter appendage was apparently the work of a newspaper reporter. Dirksen noted that although he never said the whole comment, he liked the… Read the full notes
All things Death claims. To perish is not doom, but law.
From Epigrammata: De Qualitate Temporis 7, 7 as quoted in L. De Mauri, Angelo Paredi, Gabriele Nepi, 5000 proverbi e motti latini, Hoepli Editore, 1995, p. 384 and Hubertus Kudla, Lexikon der lateinischen Zitate, C. H. Beck, 2007, p. 416… Read the full notes
Sometimes attributed to Nietzsche, the quote appears in none of his works, the likely origin is a 2012 tweet, where it was not attributed to Nietzsche. There are no earlier examples on reddit and also none on google books. Read the full notes
If you carry your childhood with you, you never become older.
Abraham Sutzkever (born 1913), quoted in "Yiddish Poet Celebrates Life with His Language" by Joseph Berger, The New York Times (17 March 1985), Section 1, page 38 Read the full notes
This is a misquotation of a prayer from the 1928 Book of Common Prayer (ministry should be industry and arrogance should be arrogancy). This was a revision from an earlier edition. The original form, written by George Lyman Locke, appeared… Read the full notes
I have a really high IQ, Phil. I mean, c'mon. It's impossible for me to not be atheist.
Attributed by photo meme to an appearance on The Phil Donahue Show in 1989. According to Snopes.com, there is no evidence he ever said this, nor that he even appeared on The Phil Donahue Show in 1989. Read the full notes
It is better to be roughly right than precisely wrong.
It is better to be vaguely right than exactly wrong. | Logic, deductive and inductive (1898), p. 351 Read the full notes
He only has the right to criticize who has the heart to help.
Original quote from William Penn (1693): They have a Right to censure, that have a Heart to help: The rest is Cruelty, not Justice. Read the full notes
In my view, Anglo-Irish history is for Englishmen to remember, for Irishmen to forget.
Often quoted as: Irish history is something no Englishman should forget and no Irishman should remember. Read the full notes
Man's best possession is a sympathetic wife.
Hippothoon, frg. 3a TrGF; misattributed to Euripides due to a confusion in Stobaeus, Anthology, IV.22.13–14 (R. Kannicht, 2004:266). Read the full notes
She's a savour to the glass,
An excuse to make it pass.
Ascribed to Suckling, The Goblins, act III, in Hoyt's New Cyclopedia of Practical Quotations (1922), p. 803. The same lines are to be found in an early dramatic sketch by Sheridan: printed in Thomas Moore (ed.) Memoirs of the Life of the… Read the full notes
A name indicates what we seek. An address indicates where it is. A route indicates how we get there.
This is often mistakenly attributed to Jon Postel, but it is actually a very slight variation on a quotation from John Shoch; both RFC-791 and its earlier version RFC-760 include, at the point in the text where this passage appears, a… Read the full notes
There's no such thing as a free lunch.
Also often misattributed to Robert A. Heinlein because both helped popularize the expression – Friedman with a book with that title. The phrase actually dates to at least the 1930s. Read the full notes
Nature's chief masterpiece is writing well.
Misattributed in Temple Bar (February 1863) p. 377, and by Giga Quotes. Read the full notes
Widely attributed to Carlyle, but actually from G. H. Lewes, Life of Goethe, ch. 3 (1855). The error likely stems from the more famous Carlyle's friendship with and numerous writings about Goethe. Read the full notes