Arthur Conan Doyle quotes

No, no: I never guess. It is a shocking habit,—destructive to the logical faculty.

— Spoken by a character · I. The Science of Deduction

How often have I said to you that when you have eliminated the impossible whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth?

— Spoken by a character · VI. Sherlock Holmes Gives a Demonstration

But love is an emotional thing, and whatever is emotional is opposed to that true cold reason which I place above all things. I should never marry myself, lest I bias my judgment.

— Spoken by a character · XII. The Strange Story of Jonathan Small

I cannot live without brain-work. What else is there to live for? Stand at the window here. Was ever such a dreary, dismal, unprofitable world?

— Spoken by a character · I. The Science of Deduction

Some facts should be suppressed, or at least a just sense of proportion should be observed in treating them.

— Spoken by a character · I. The Science of Deduction

“You know my methods. Apply them, and it will be instructive to compare results.”

— Spoken by a character · VI. Sherlock Holmes Gives a Demonstration

He possesses two out of the three qualities necessary for the ideal detective. He has the power of observation and that of deduction. He is only wanting in knowledge; and that may come in time.

— Sherlock Holmes · I. The Science of Deduction

“Women are never to be entirely trusted,—not the best of them.”

— Holmes · IX. A Break in the Chain

Because you are within my reach again,” I said, taking her hand. She did not withdraw it. “Because I love you, Mary, as truly as ever a man loved a woman.

— Spoken by a character · XI. The Great Agra Treasure

One of our greatest statesmen has said that a change of work is the best rest. So it is.

— Spoken by a character · X. The End of the Islander

You see, but you do not observe. The distinction is clear.

— Spoken by a character · I. A SCANDAL IN BOHEMIA

It is a capital mistake to theorise before one has data.

— Spoken by a character · I. A SCANDAL IN BOHEMIA

“There is nothing more deceptive than an obvious fact,” he answered, laughing.

— Spoken by a character · IV. THE BOSCOMBE VALLEY MYSTERY

To Sherlock Holmes she is always the woman.

Never trust to general impressions, my boy, but concentrate yourself upon details.

— Spoken by a character · III. A CASE OF IDENTITY

When a doctor does go wrong he is the first of criminals.

— Spoken by a character · VIII. THE ADVENTURE OF THE SPECKLED BAND

Violence does, in truth, recoil upon the violent, and the schemer falls into the pit which he digs for another.

— Holmes · VIII. THE ADVENTURE OF THE SPECKLED BAND

I am lost without my Boswell.

— Spoken by a character · I. A SCANDAL IN BOHEMIA

Well,” he said, “I say now, as I said then, that 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 it.

— Spoken by a character · V. THE FIVE ORANGE PIPS

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.

— Spoken by a character · III. A CASE OF IDENTITY

The world is full of obvious things which nobody by any chance ever observes.

— Spoken by a character · 3. The Problem

Evil indeed is the man who has not one woman to mourn him.

There is nothing more stimulating than a case where everything goes against you.

— Spoken by a character · 5. Three Broken Threads

The devil’s agents may be of flesh and blood, may they not?

— Spoken by a character · 3. The Problem

If I have set it down it is because that which is clearly known hath less terror than that which is but hinted at and guessed.

— Spoken by a character · 2. The Curse of the Baskervilles

Say, rather, into the region where we balance probabilities and choose the most likely. It is the scientific use of the imagination, but we have always some material basis on which to start our speculation.

— Spoken by a character · 4. Sir Henry Baskerville

“It seems to leave the darkness rather blacker than before.”

— Spoken by a character · 10. Extract from the Diary of Dr. Watson

Some people without possessing genius have a remarkable power of stimulating it.

— Spoken by a character · 1. Mr. Sherlock Holmes

It may be that you are not yourself luminous, but you are a conductor of light.

— Spoken by a character · 1. Mr. Sherlock Holmes

There’s a light in a woman’s eyes that speaks louder than words.

— Spoken by a character · 9. The Light upon the Moor [Second Report of Dr. Watson]

There’s the scarlet thread of murder running through the colourless skein of life, and our duty is to unravel it, and isolate it, and expose every inch of it.

— Spoken by a character · IV. WHAT JOHN RANCE HAD TO TELL

“It is a capital mistake to theorize before you have all the evidence. It biases the judgment.”

— Spoken by a character · III. THE LAURISTON GARDENS MYSTERY

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.

— Spoken by a character · II. THE SCIENCE OF DEDUCTION

“To a great mind, nothing is little,” remarked Holmes, sententiously.

— Holmes · VI. TOBIAS GREGSON SHOWS WHAT HE CAN DO

“One’s ideas must be as broad as Nature if they are to interpret Nature,” he answered.

— Spoken by a character · V. OUR ADVERTISEMENT BRINGS A VISITOR

There is a mystery about this which stimulates the imagination; where there is no imagination there is no horror.

— Spoken by a character · V. OUR ADVERTISEMENT BRINGS A VISITOR

No man burdens his mind with small matters unless he has some very good reason for doing so.

His ignorance was as remarkable as his knowledge.

So all life is a great chain, the nature of which is known whenever we are shown a single link of it.

— Spoken by a character · II. THE SCIENCE OF DEDUCTION

Desultory readers are seldom remarkable for the exactness of their learning.

I'm like an old golf-ball--I've had all the white paint knocked off me long ago. Life can whack me about now, and it can't leave a mark. But a sportin' risk, young fellah, that's the salt of existence.

— Spoken by a character · Chapter VI

There are heroisms all round us waiting to be done. It's for men to do them, and for women to reserve their love as a reward for such men.

— Spoken by a character · Chapter I

Why on earth people who have something to say which is worth hearing should not take the slight trouble to learn how to make it heard is one of the strange mysteries of modern life.

The bent head, the averted eye, the faltering voice, the wincing figure--these, and not the unshrinking gaze and frank reply, are the true signals of passion.

My instincts are all against a woman being too frank and at her ease with me. It is no compliment to a man.

The individual must not monopolize what is meant for the world.

— Spoken by a character · Chapter IV

Brain, character, soul--only as one sees more of life does one understand how distinct is each.

There's many a man who never tells his adventures, for he can't hope to be believed.

— Lord John · Chapter X

There are strange red depths in the soul of the most commonplace man.

It was surely well for man that he came late in the order of creation. There were powers abroad in earlier days which no courage and no mechanism of his could have met.

— Spoken by a character · Chapter XI

The temptation to form premature theories upon insufficient data is the bane of our profession.

— Spoken by a character · II. Sherlock Holmes Discourses

It is an old maxim of mine that when you have excluded the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.

— Spoken by a character

I shall enumerate them to you, for nothing clears up a case so much as stating it to another person, and I can hardly expect your co-operation if I do not show you the position from which we start.

— Spoken by a character · I. Silver Blaze