Acros the 56 short stories and 4 books are a myriad of insightful quotes. These are simply some favourites. The story source is in given after each quote. They are gouped into our seleced themes:
The Quotes
In Converation
01. “Excellent!" I cried. "Elementary," said he. Croo
02. Watson. Come at once if convenient. If inconvenient, come all the same Cree
03. It is quite a three-pipe problem, and I beg that you won't speak to me for fifty minutes Redh
04. Good old Watson! You are the one fixed point in a changing age. Last
05. You have a grand gift for silence, Watson. It makes you quite invaluable as a companion.”
06. Some people without possessing genius have a remarkable power of stimulating it. I confess, my dear fellow, that I am very much in your debt.
07. The game is afoot. Abbe
General
On Evidence
01. As a rule, the more bizarre a thing is, the less mysterious it proves to be.
02. How often have I said to you that when you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth? Sign
03. I have no data yet. It is a capital mistake to theorise before one has data. Insensibly one begins to twist facts to suit theories, instead of theories to suit facts.
04. It is a capital mistake to theorize before you have all the evidence. It biases the judgment Stud
05. "I had,” said he, “come to an entirely erroneous conclusion which shows, my dear Watson, how dangerous it always is to reason from insufficient data.” Spec
06. Give me your details, and from an armchair I will return you an excellent expert opinion.
07. Nothing clears up a case so much as stating it to another person. Silv
08. You see, but you do not observe. Scan
09. You know my method. It is founded upon the observation of trifles. Croo
10.There is nothing more deceptive than an obvious fact. Bosc
11. You must come round to my view, for otherwise I shall keep piling fact upon fact on you, until your reason breaks down under them and acknowledges me to be right. Redh
12. Circumstantial evidence is a very tricky thing. Bosc
Philosophical
01. It is not easy to express the inexpressible
02. But no chain is stronger than its weakest link
03. It is better to learn wisdom late than never to learn it at all
04. It has long been an axiom of mine that the little things are infinitely the most important. Iden
05. Where there is no imagination there is no horror Stud
06. Mediocrity knows nothing higher than itself, but talent instantly recognizes genius Vall
07. Now is the dramatic moment of fate, Watson, when you hear a step upon the stair which is walking into your life, and you know not whether for good or ill.
08. What you do in this world is a matter of no consequence. The question is what can you make people believe you have done Scar
09. It may be that you are not yourself luminous, but that you are a conductor of light. Some people without possessing genius have a remarkable power of stimulating it
10. Life is infinitely stranger than anything which the mind of man could invent. We would not dare to conceive the things which are really mere commonplaces of existence. If we could fly out of that window hand in hand, hover over this great city, gently remove the roofs, and and peep in at the queer things which are going on, the strange coincidences, the plannings, the cross-purposes, the wonderful chains of events, working through generations, and leading to the most outre results, it would make all fiction with its conventionalities and foreseen conclusions most stale and unprofitable
11. There is nothing more to be said or to be done tonight, so hand me over my violin and let us try to forget for half an hour the miserable weather and the still more miserable ways of our fellowmen Pips
12. The past and the present are within my field of inquiry, but what a man may do in the future is a hard question to answer.
The Brain
01. A man should keep his little brain attic stocked with all the furniture that he is likely to use, and the rest he can put away in the lumber-room of his library where he can get it if he wants. Five
02. My brain has always governed my heart
03. I cannot live without brainwork. What else is there to live for? Stand at the window here. Was ever such a dreary, dismal, unprofitable world? See how the yellow fog swirls down the street and drifts across the duncoloured houses. What could be more hopelessly prosaic and material? Sign/p>
04. A man should keep his little brain attic stocked with all the furniture that he is likely to use, and the rest he can put away in the lumber-room of his library where he can get it if he wants. FIVE
05. Now that I do know it, I shall do my best to forget it Stud
06. I consider that a man’s brain originally is like a little empty attic, and you have to stock it with such furniture as you choose. A fool takes in all the lumber of every sort that he comes across, so that the knowledge which might be useful to him gets crowded out, or at best is jumbled up with a lot of other things, so that he has a difficulty in laying his hands on it. Now the skillful workman is very careful indeed as to what he takes into his brain-attic. He will have nothing but the tools which may help him in doing his work, but of these he has a large assortment, and all in the most perfect order. It is a mistake to think that little room has elastic walls and can distend to any extent. Depend uon it – there comes a time when for every addition of knowledge you forget something that you knew before. It is of the highest importance, therefore, not to have useless facts elbowing out the useful ones. STUD
07. I am a brain, Watson. The rest of me is a mere appendix Maza
08. No man burdens his mind with small matters unless he has some very good reason for doing so. Scar
09. My mind,” he said, “rebels at stagnation. Give me problems, give me work, give me the most abstruse cryptogram or the most intricate analysis, and I am in my own proper atmosphere. I can dispense then with artificial stimulants. But I abhor the dull routine of existence. I crave for mental exaltation. That is why I have chosen my own particular profession, or rather created it, for I am the only one in the world. Sign
Personal
01. I play the game for the game’s own sake
02. The example of patient suffering is in itself the most precious of all lessons to an impatient world.
03. If I could be assured of your destruction, I would in the interest of the public, cheerfully accept my death.
04. I am the most incurably lazy devil that ever stood in shoe leather.