Misattributed quotes

Books are “imaginative rehearsals for living,” stated novelist George Santayana. They are also a great equalizer in a diverse society. Book reading helps prepare a child for mental liberation from ignorance, fear, and falsehood.

The lockdown’s lesson in reading books aloud, Christian Science Monitor (22 June 2020) Read the full notes

"The terrorists in Iraq believe their attacks on innocent people will weaken our resolve. They believe we will run from a challenge. They are mistaken. Americans are not the running kind."

Yahoo News article October 10, 2003 This statement is identical to one made by President George W. Bush on October 9, 2003 and is likely to have been a mis-reporting of Wolfowitz quoting Bush's statement. Read the full notes

I can see Russia from my house.

Parody of her statement to Charles Gibson in a ABC News interview, "They're our next-door neighbors, and you can actually see Russia from land here in Alaska, from an island in Alaska." (See above.) Read the full notes

Statistics are used much like a drunk uses a lamppost: for support, not illumination.

Actually said by Andrew Lang, in a 1910 speech: "Politicians use statistics in the same way that a drunk uses lamp-posts—for support rather than illumination", as quoted in Alan L. Mackay, The Harvest of a Quiet Eye (1977), and reported in… Read the full notes

People are dying today that have never died before.

According to Snopes.com, there is no record of Trump saying this. Read the full notes

Beauty is desired in order that it may be befouled; not for its own sake, but for the joy brought by the certainty of profaning it. [Elle est désirée pour la salir. Non pour elle-même, mais pour la joie goûtée dans la certitude de la profaner.]

Georges Bataille, Erotism (1962) [City Lights Books, 1991, trans. Mary Dalwood, ISBN 0872861902], part I, ch. XIII, p. 144 Read the full notes

He þat is ute biloken
he is inne sone forgeten.

The Proverbs of Alfred, st. 19, as published in The Dialogue of Salomon and Saturnus (1848), edited by John Mitchell Kemble, p. 242. Read the full notes

Soon, for me, the light of day
Shall for ever, pass away;
Then, from sin and sorrow, free,
Take me, Lord, to dwell with Thee.

Also by William Croswell Doane's father, George Washington Doane. It is from the poem "Evening" in Songs by the Way: The Poetical Writings of the Right Rev. George Washington Doane, DD., LL.D., arranged and edited by his son William… Read the full notes

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

Widely attributed to Shaw, this quotation is actually of unknown origin. Read the full notes

What I hear, I forget. What I say, I remember. What I do, I understand.

Tell me and I [will] forget. Show me and I [will] remember. Involve me and I [will] understand. | 不聞不若聞之，聞之不若見之，見之不若知之，知之不若行之；學至於行之而止矣 | From Xun Zi 荀子 Read the full notes

When I was as you are now, towering in the confidence of twenty-one, little did I suspect that I should be at forty-nine, what I now am.

Samuel Johnson, in a letter to Bennet Langton , published in The Life of Samuel Johnson, LL.D. (1791), by James Boswell Read the full notes

The Church recruited people who had been starched and ironed before they were washed.

John Wesley Lord, as quoted in TIME magazine (1 February 1963) Read the full notes

I, who ne'er
Went for myself a begging, go a borrowing,
And that for others. Borrowing's much the same
As begging; just as lending upon usury
Is much the same as thieving.

Gotthold Ephraim Lessing, Nathan the Wise (1779), Act II, scene II Read the full notes

To ask may be but a moment's shame, not to ask and remain ignorant is a lifelong shame.

This is quoted in several published books as a Japanese proverb, without any mention of Jigoro Kano as author. Read the full notes

The United States—bounded on the north by the Aurora Borealis, on the south by the precession of the equinoxes, on the east by the primeval chaos, and on the west by the Day of Judgment.

Among the legends of our late Civil War there is a story of a dinner-party given by the Americans residing in Paris, at which were propounded sundry toasts concerning not so much the past and present as the expected glories of the great… Read the full notes

Among those [Syrian] refugees are no doubt a significant number of ISIS terrorists.

Misquoted by Ted Cruz. According to the source, "Clapper said it was a “huge concern” that ISIS could try to infiltrate the refugees. Clapper also expressed confidence in the United States’ ability to screen refugee applicants." Read the full notes

It is one of the misfortunes of our political system that parties are formed more with reference to controversies that are gone by than to the controversies which these parties have actually to decide.

Statement of an uncredited reviewer in The Quarterly Review [London] (January 1866), p. 277 Read the full notes

Corruption is government intrusion into market efficiencies in the form of regulations.

Frequently misattributed to Milton Friedman based on a monologue from the 2005 movie Syriana Read the full notes

It is amazing what you can accomplish if you do not care who gets the credit*

This is attributed to Truman in some sources, but a similar saying is recorded as early as 1863. Read the full notes

Moderation has been called a virtue to limit the ambition of great men, and to console undistinguished people for their want of fortune and their lack of merit.

Not Disraeli but La Rochefoucauld; it is Maxim 308 in his Reflections. Read the full notes