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The truth is cruel, but it can be loved, and it makes free those who have loved it.

— George Santayana Little Essays (1921)

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Truth

More quotes by George Santayana

Fanaticism consists in redoubling your efforts when you have forgotten your aim.

The Life of Reason: The Phases of Human Progress (1905)

There is no cure for birth and death save to enjoy the interval.

Soliloquies in England and Later Soliloquies (1922)

Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.

The Life of Reason: The Phases of Human Progress (1905)

To covet truth is a very distinguished passion.

The Genteel Tradition in American Philosophy (1911)

Theory helps us to bear our ignorance of fact.

The Sense of Beauty (1896)

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You have to start with the truth. The truth is the only way that we can get anywhere. Because any decision-making that is based upon lies or ignorance can't lead to a good conclusion.

Julian Assange

False words are not only evil in themselves, but they infect the soul with evil.

Socrates

I believe in evil. It is the property of all those who are certain of truth. Despair and fanaticism are only differing manifestations of evil.

Edward Teller

Wars produce many stories of fiction, some of which are told until they are believed to be true.

Ulysses S. Grant Personal Memoirs of General U. S. Grant (1885)

Attribution

Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: George Santayana (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.