George Bernard Shaw 1856–1950
Irish dramatist 

1. All great truths begin as blasphemies.
   Annajanska (1919)
2. One man that has a mind and knows it can always beat ten men who haven't and don't.
   The Apple Cart (1930) act 1
3. You can always tell an old soldier by the inside of his holsters and cartridge boxes. The young ones carry pistols and cartridges; the old ones, grub.
   Arms and the Man (1898) act 1
4. Oh, you are a very poor soldier—a chocolate cream soldier!
   Arms and the Man (1898) act 1
5. You see things; and you say ‘Why?’ But I dream things that never were; and I say ‘Why not?’
   Back to Methuselah (1921) pt. 1, act 1
6. I enjoy convalescence. It is the part that makes the illness worth while.
   Back to Methuselah (1921) pt. 2
7. Silence is the most perfect expression of scorn.
   Back to Methuselah (1921) pt. 5
8. Life is not meant to be easy, my child; but take courage: it can be delightful.
   Back to Methuselah (rev. ed., 1930); see also Fraser
9. He [the Briton] is a barbarian, and thinks that the customs of his tribe and island are the laws of nature.
   Caesar and Cleopatra (1901) act 2
10. When a stupid man is doing something he is ashamed of, he always declares that it is his duty.
    Caesar and Cleopatra (1901) act 3
11. He who has never hoped can never despair.
    Caesar and Cleopatra (1901) act 4
12. A man of great common sense and good taste, meaning thereby a man without originality or moral courage.
    Notes to Caesar and Cleopatra (1901) ‘Julius Caesar’
13. We have no more right to consume happiness without producing it than to consume wealth without producing it.
    Candida (1898) act 1
14. Do you think that the things people make fools of themselves about are any less real and true than the things they behave sensibly about? They are more true: they are the only things that are true.
    Candida (1898) act 1
15. It is easy—terribly easy— to shake a man's faith in himself. To take advantage of that to break a man's spirit is devil's work.
    Candida (1898) act 1
16. I'm only a beer teetotaller, not a champagne teetotaller.
    Candida (1898) act 3
17. The worst sin towards our fellow creatures is not to hate them, but to be indifferent to them: that's the essence of inhumanity.
    The Devil's Disciple (1901) act 2
18. Martyrdom…the only way in which a man can become famous without ability.
    The Devil's Disciple (1901) act 3
19. There is at bottom only one genuinely scientific treatment for all diseases, and that is to stimulate the phagocytes.
    The Doctor's Dilemma (1911) act 1
20. All professions are conspiracies against the laity.
    The Doctor's Dilemma (1911) act 1
21. Parentage is a very important profession, but no test of fitness for it is ever imposed in the interest of the children.
    Everybody's Political What's What? (1944) ch. 9
22. A government which robs Peter to pay Paul can always depend on the support of Paul.
    Everybody's Political What's What? (1944) ch. 30
23. It's all that the young can do for the old, to shock them and keep them up to date.
    Fanny's First Play (1914) ‘Induction’
24. You don't expect me to know what to say about a play when I don't know who the author is, do you?
    Fanny's First Play (1914) epilogue
25. The one point on which all women are in furious secret rebellion against the existing law is the saddling of the right to a child with the obligation to become the servant of a man.
    Getting Married (1911)
26. You have to choose (as a voter) between trusting to the natural stability of gold and the natural stability of the honesty and intelligence of the members of the Government. And, with due respect for these gentlemen, I advise you, as long as the Capitalist system lasts, to vote for gold.
    The Intelligent Woman's Guide to Socialism and Capitalism (1928) ch. 55
27. The greatest of evils and the worst of crimes is poverty.
    Major Barbara (1907) preface
28. I am a Millionaire. That is my religion.
    Major Barbara (1907) act 2
29. Wot prawce Selvytion nah?
    Major Barbara (1907) act 2
30. He knows nothing; and he thinks he knows everything. That points clearly to a political career.
    Major Barbara (1907) act 3
31. Like all young men, you greatly exaggerate the difference between one young woman and another.
    Major Barbara (1907) act 3; see Mencken
32. But a lifetime of happiness! No man alive could bear it: it would be hell on earth.
    Man and Superman (1903) act 1
33. The more things a man is ashamed of, the more respectable he is.
    Man and Superman (1903) act 1
34. The true artist will let his wife starve, his children go barefoot, his mother drudge for his living at seventy, sooner than work at anything but his art.
    Man and Superman (1903) act 1
35. Of all human struggles there is none so treacherous and remorseless as the struggle between the artist man and the mother woman.
    Man and Superman (1903) act 1
36. There is no love sincerer than the love of food.
    Man and Superman (1903) act 1
37. You think that you are Ann's suitor; that you are the pursuer and she the pursued…Fool: it is you who are the pursued, the marked down quarry, the destined prey.
    Man and Superman (1903) act 2
38. Hell is full of musical amateurs: music is the brandy of the damned.
    Man and Superman (1903) act 3
39. Englishmen never will be slaves: they are free to do whatever the Government and public opinion allow them to do.
    Man and Superman (1903) act 3
40. An Englishman thinks he is moral when he is only uncomfortable.
    Man and Superman (1903) act 3
41. In the arts of life man invents nothing; but in the arts of death he outdoes Nature herself, and produces by chemistry and machinery all the slaughter of plague, pestilence and famine.
    Man and Superman (1903) act 3
42. As an old soldier I admit the cowardice: it's as universal as sea sickness, and matters just as little.
    Man and Superman (1903) act 3
43. Beauty is all very well at first sight; but who ever looks at it when it has been in the house three days?
    Man and Superman (1903) act 4
44. There are two tragedies in life. One is not to get your heart's desire. The other is to get it.
    Man and Superman (1903) act 4
45. Revolutions have never lightened the burden of tyranny: they have only shifted it to another shoulder.
    Man and Superman (1903) ‘The Revolutionist's Handbook’ foreword
46. It is dangerous to be sincere unless you are also stupid.
    Man and Superman (1903) ‘The Revolutionist's Handbook’
47. Democracy substitutes election by the incompetent many for appointment by the corrupt few.
    Man and Superman (1903) ‘Maxims: Democracy’
48. Liberty means responsibility. That is why most men dread it.
    Man and Superman (1903) ‘Maxims: Liberty and Equality’
49. He who can, does. He who cannot, teaches.
    Man and Superman (1903) ‘Maxims: Education’
50. Marriage is popular because it combines the maximum of temptation with the maximum of opportunity.
    Man and Superman (1903) ‘Maxims: Marriage’
51. Titles distinguish the mediocre, embarrass the superior, and are disgraced by the inferior.
    Man and Superman (1903) ‘Maxims: Titles’
52. Do not do unto others as you would that they should do unto you. Their tastes may not be the same.
    Man and Superman (1903) ‘Maxims for Revolutionists: The Golden Rule’
53. When a man wants to murder a tiger he calls it sport; when a tiger wants to murder him, he calls it ferocity.
    Man and Superman (1903) ‘Maxims for Revolutionists: Crime and Punishment’
54. When domestic servants are treated as human beings it is not worth while to keep them.
    Man and Superman (1903) ‘Maxims for Revolutionists: Servants’
55. If you strike a child take care that you strike it in anger, even at the risk of maiming it for life. A blow in cold blood neither can nor should be forgiven.
    Man and Superman (1903) ‘Maxims: How to Beat Children’
56. Beware of the man whose god is in the skies.
    Man and Superman (1903) ‘Maxims: Religion’
57. The reasonable man adapts himself to the world: the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man.
    Man and Superman (1903) ‘Maxims: Reason’
58. Home is the girl's prison and the woman's workhouse.
    Man and Superman (1903) ‘Maxims: Women in the Home’
59. Every man over forty is a scoundrel.
    Man and Superman (1903) ‘Maxims: Stray Sayings’
60. Youth, which is forgiven everything, forgives itself nothing: age, which forgives itself everything, is forgiven nothing.
    Man and Superman (1903) ‘Maxims: Stray Sayings’
61. Take care to get what you like or you will be forced to like what you get.
    Man and Superman (1903) ‘Maxims: Stray Sayings’
62. Beware of the man who does not return your blow: he neither forgives you nor allows you to forgive yourself.
    Man and Superman (1903) ‘Maxims: Stray Sayings’
63. Self-sacrifice enables us to sacrifice other people without blushing.
    Man and Superman (1903) ‘Maxims: Self-Sacrifice’
64. You'll never have a quiet world till you knock the patriotism out of the human race.
    O'Flaherty V.C. (1919)
65. As long as I have a want, I have a reason for living. Satisfaction is death.
    Overruled (1916)
66. The secret of being miserable is to have leisure to bother about whether you are happy or not. The cure for it is occupation.
    Parents and Children (1914) ‘Children's Happiness’
67. A perpetual holiday is a good working definition of hell.
    Parents and Children (1914) ‘Children's Happiness’
68. There is only one religion, though there are a hundred versions of it.
    Plays Pleasant and Unpleasant (1898) vol. 2, preface
69. It is impossible for an Englishman to open his mouth without making some other Englishman hate or despise him.
    Pygmalion (1916) preface
70. I don't want to talk grammar, I want to talk like a lady.
    Pygmalion (1916) act 2
71. pickering: Have you no morals, man?
    doolittle: Can't afford them, Governor.
    
    Pygmalion (1916) act 2
72. I'm one of the undeserving poor…up agen middle-class morality all the time…What is middle-class morality? Just an excuse for never giving me anything.
    Pygmalion (1916) act 2
73. Walk! Not bloody likely. I am going in a taxi.
    Pygmalion (1916) act 3
74. If ever I utter an oath again may my soul be blasted to eternal damnation!
    Saint Joan (1924) sc. 2
75. A miracle, my friend, is an event which creates faith. That is the purpose and nature of miracles…Frauds deceive. An event which creates faith does not deceive: therefore it is not a fraud, but a miracle.
    Saint Joan (1924) sc. 2
76. Must then a Christ perish in torment in every age to save those that have no imagination?
    Saint Joan (1924) epilogue
77. Assassination is the extreme form of censorship.
    The Showing-Up of Blanco Posnet (1911) ‘Limits to Toleration’
78. ‘Do you know what a pessimist is?’ ‘A man who thinks everybody is as nasty as himself, and hates them for it.’
    An Unsocial Socialist (1887) ch. 5
79. The great advantage of a hotel is that it's a refuge from home life.
    You Never Can Tell (1898) act 2
80. With the single exception of Homer, there is no eminent writer, not even Sir Walter Scott, whom I can despise so entirely as I despise Shakespeare when I measure my mind against his.
    in Saturday Review 26 September 1896
81. The photographer is like the cod which produces a million eggs in order that one may reach maturity.
    introduction to the catalogue for an exhibition at the Royal Photographic Society, 1906
82. I am afraid we must make the world honest before we can honestly say to our children that honesty is the best policy.
    ‘Rungs of the Ladder’ BBC radio broadcast 11 July 1932
83. The trouble, Mr Goldwyn, is that you are only interested in art and I am only interested in money.
    telegraphed version of the outcome of a conversation between Shaw and Sam Goldwyn
    Alva Johnson The Great Goldwyn (1937) ch. 3
84. [Dancing is] a perpendicular expression of a horizontal desire.
    in New Statesman 23 March 1962
85. England and America are two countries divided by a common language.
    attributed in this and other forms to George Bernard Shaw, but not found in Shaw's published writings; see Wilde