It is double pleasure to deceive the deceiver.
Misattribution popularized by internet sources. A similar phrase appears in Fontaine's Fables ("What greater pleasure than to cheat the cheater!") Read the full notes
Misattributed quotes
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.
I'm armed with more than complete steel,—
The justice of my quarrel.
Lust's Dominion (c. 1600), Act iii. scene 4. Compare: "Thrice is he armed that hath his quarrel just, And he but naked, though locked up in steel, Whose conscience with injustice is corrupted", William Shakespeare, Henry VI, Act iii. scene… Read the full notes
Edwin Hubbell Chapin, as quoted in Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895) by Josiah Hotchkiss Gilbert Read the full notes
In God we trust. All others must bring data.
Frequently attributed to Deming; it appears in The Deming Management Method, by Mary Walton, 1986, p. 96, without any attribution, to Deming or anyone else | Chapter 20: Doing It with Data: "In God we trust. All others must bring data." If… Read the full notes
Put down the pen someone else gave you. No one ever drafted a life worth living on borrowed ink.
Not a Kerouac quote, but part of the text from a publicity campaign for the Beat Museum, San Francisco, composed by the advertising agency Gyro: https://paulacw.com/The-Beat-Museum Read the full notes
Women oppose change, receive passively, and add nothing of their own
Alledgedly written in 'The Psychical Consequences of the Anatomic Distinction Between the Sexes', but Freud neither says this nor argues this exact sentiment. Possible originates from Donna Stewart Read the full notes
In the fight between you and the world, back the world.
Sourced to Franz Kafka, Betrachtungen (Reflections), Number 52, ca. 1917. See, for instance, Reflections on Sin, Suffering, Hope, and the True Way. Read the full notes
As quoted in Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895) edited by Josiah Hotchkiss Gilbert, p. 285 Read the full notes
Each of us is responsible for everything and to every human being.
Fyodor Dostoevsky in The Brothers Karamazov; this was used as an epigraph in The Blood of Others, and is sometimes attributed to de Beauvoir Read the full notes
Actually from Frederic Harrison's essay "Ruskin as Prophet", in his Tennyson, Ruskin, Mill, and Other Literary Estimates (1899). Read the full notes
This is actually a translation of a statement by Lao Zi from the Tao Te Ching (Daodejing). Patton may have used a similar or identical expression, perhaps quoting the book. Read the full notes
If you want something you have never had, you must be willing to do something you have never done.
Not found in Jefferson's writings, according to the Jefferson Monticello center. First known appearance in print is from 2004. Read the full notes
The real war is within us. History is a symptom of our disease.
This is a line from the 1995 film Nixon written by Oliver Stone, Christopher Wilkinson, and Stephen J. Rivele. The line is spoken by Mao (portrayed by Ric Young) through an interpreter during a fictionalized version of his meeting with… Read the full notes
Robert Fripp, a student of Gurdjieff's philosophy, in An Introduction to Guitar Craft (1988). This has sometimes been quoted as a remark by Gurdjieff on the Fourth Way. Read the full notes
Men are governed by lines of intellect - women: by curves of emotion.
Oscar Wilde, in "An Ideal Husband (1895)," Act IV Read the full notes
He that is a friend to himself, is a friend to all mankind.
"I shall tell you what pleased me today in the writings of Hecato; it is these words: 'What progress, you ask, have I made? I have begun to be a friend to myself.' That was indeed a great benefit; such a person can never be alone. You may… Read the full notes
Sir Alfred Jules Ayer, in his "The Meaning of Life", collected in The Meaning of Life, and Other Essays (1990) Read the full notes
The day of fortune is like a harvest day,
We must be busy when the corn is ripe.
Ein Tag der Gunst ist wie ein Tag der Ernte: Man muss geschäftig sein, sobald sie reift. Read the full notes
The single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has taken place.
The attribution to Shaw comes from Leadership Skills for Managers (2000) by Marlene Caroselli, p. 71. But this quote seems more likely to come from William H. Whyte. Read the full notes
If my mind can conceive it; and my heart can believe it — then I can achieve it.
Similar to a quote by Jesse Jackson, which is in turn a modification of a quote by Napoleon Hill: "Whatever the mind of man can conceive and believe, it can achieve." Read the full notes