The free expression of opinion, as experience has taught us, is the safety-valve of passion. The noise of the rushing steam, when it escapes, alarms the timid; but it is the sign that we are safe. The concession of reasonable privilege anticipates the growth of furious appetite.
—William Ewart Gladstone (1809–98) English Liberal Statesman, Prime Minister
I will utter what I believe today, if it should contradict all I said yesterday.
—Wendell Phillips (1811–84) American Abolitionist, Lawyer, Orator
A fellow can’t keep people from having a bad opinion of him, but he can keep them from being right about it.
—Unknown
Nothing so obstinately stands in the way of all sorts of progress as pride of opinion; while nothing is so foolish and baseless.
—Josiah Gilbert Holland (1819–81) American Editor, Novelist
My opinion is a view I hold until … well, until I find something that changes it.
—Luigi Pirandello (1867–1936) Italian Dramatist, Novelist, Short Story Writer, Author
The important thing is not what they think of me, but what I think of them.
—Queen Victoria (1819–1901) British Royal
I care not so much what I am in the opinion of others as what I am in my own; I would be rich of myself and not by borrowing.
—Michel de Montaigne (1533–92) French Essayist
Men get opinions as boys learn to spell by reiteration chiefly.
—Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1806–61) English Poet
History is a voice forever sounding across the centuries the laws of right and wrong. Opinions alter, manners change, creeds rise and fall, but the moral law is written on the tablets of eternity. For every false word or unrighteous deed, for cruelty and oppression, for lust or vanity, the price has to be paid at last.
—James Anthony Froude (1818–94) British Historian, Novelist, Biographer, Editor
It is always considered as a piece of impertinence in England, if a man of less than two or three thousand a year has any opinions at all upon important subjects.
—Sydney Smith (1771–1845) English Clergyman, Essayist, Wit
I’ve never had a humble opinion in my life. If you’re going to have one, why bother to be humble about it?
—Joan Baez (b.1941) American Singer, Songwriter, Musician
The only means of strengthening one’s intellect is to make up one’s mind about nothing –to let the mind be a thoroughfare for all thoughts. Not a select party.
—John Keats (1795–1821) English Poet
As for the differences of opinion upon speculative questions, if we wait till they are reconciled, the action of human affairs must be suspended forever. — But neither are we to look for perfection in any one man, nor for agreement among many.
—Junius Unidentified English Writer
I think that we should be eternally vigilant against attempts to check the expression of opinions that we loathe and believe to be fraught with death, unless they so imminently threaten immediate interference with the lawful and pressing purposes of the law that an immediate check is required to save the country.
—Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. (1841–1935) American Jurist, Author
Reality doesn’t wait for your opinion, vote, or permission, sweetheart. It just keeps being what it is and doing what it does.
—Byron Katie (b.1942) American Speaker, Author
Science is the father of knowledge, but opinion breeds ignorance.
—Hippocrates (460–370 BCE) Ancient Greek Physician
A baby is God’s opinion that life should go on.
—Carl Sandburg (1878–1967) American Biographer, Novelist, Socialist
We cling to our own point of view, as though everything depended on it. Yet our opinions have no permanence; like autumn and winter, they gradually pass away.
—Zhuang Zhou (c.369–c.286 BCE) Chinese Taoist Philosopher
One accurate measurement is worth a thousand expert opinions.
—Grace Hopper (1906–92) American Naval Officer, Mathematician
I want to find someone on the earth so intelligent that he welcomes opinions which he condemns.
—John Jay Chapman (1862–1933) American Biographer, Poet, Essayist, Writer
Public opinion, a vulgar, impertinent, anonymous tyrant who deliberately makes life unpleasant for anyone who is not content to be the average man.
—William Motter Inge (1913–73) American Playwright, Novelist
Public opinion is a weak tyrant, compared with our private opinion – what a man thinks of himself, that is which determines, or rather indicates his fate.
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–62) American Philosopher
Things are not to be judged good or bad merely because the public think so.
—Tacitus (56–117) Roman Orator, Historian
He who has no opinion of his own, but depends upon the opinion and taste of others, is a slave.
—Friedrich Gottlieb Klopstock (1724–1803) German Poet
I used to look down on the world for being corrupt, but now I adore it for the utter magnificence of that corruption.
—Richard J. Needham (1912–96) Canadian Humorist, Columnist, Writer
He that never changes his opinion never corrects mistakes and will never be wiser on the morrow than he is today.
—Tryon Edwards American Theologian
Statutes are mere milestones, telling how far yesterday’s thought had travelled; and the talk of the sidewalk today is the law of the land. — With us, law is nothing unless close behind it stands a warm, living public opinion.
—Wendell Phillips (1811–84) American Abolitionist, Lawyer, Orator
Arguments only confirm people in their own opinions.
—Booth Tarkington (1869–1946) American Novelist, Dramatist
A public opinion poll is no substitute for thought.
—Warren Buffett (b.1930) American Investor
People talk fundamentals and superlatives and then make some changes of detail.
—Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. (1841–1935) American Jurist, Author
A study of the history of opinion is a necessary preliminary to the emancipation of the mind.
—John Maynard Keynes (1883–1946) English Economist
Man is a gregarious animal, and much more so in his mind than in his body. He may like to go alone for a walk, but he hates to stand alone in his opinions.
—George Santayana (1863–1952) Spanish-American Poet, Philosopher
Where an opinion is general, it is usually correct.
—Jane Austen (1775–1817) English Novelist
Nobody holds a good opinion of a man who has a low opinion of himself.
—Anthony Trollope (1815–82) English Novelist
A lawyer’s opinion is worth nothing unless paid for.
—Common Proverb
Public opinion is a permeating influence, and it exacts obedience to itself; it requires us to think other men’s thoughts, to speak other men’s words, to follow other men’s habits.
—Walter Bagehot (1826–77) English Economist, Journalist
I do not regret having braved public opinion, when I knew it was wrong and was sure it would be merciless.
—Horace Greeley (1811–72) American Elected Rep, Politician, Reformer, Editor
If there be any among us who would wish to dissolve this Union or to change its republican form, let them stand undisturbed as monuments of the safety with which error of opinion may be tolerated where reason is left free to combat it.
—Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826) American Head of State, Lawyer
They look for a victim to chivy, and howl him down, and finally lynch him in a sheer storm of sexual frenzy which they honestly imagine to be moral indignation, patriotic passion or some equally allowable emotion, it may be an innocent Negro, a Jew like Leo Frank, a harmless half-witted German; a Christ-like idealist of the type of Debs, an enthusiastic reformer like Emma Goldman.
—Aleister Crowley (1875–1947) English Occultist, Mystic, Magician
I care not what others think of what I do, but I care very much about what I think of what I do. That is character.
—Theodore Roosevelt (1858–1919) American Head of State, Political leader, Historian, Explorer
Men who borrow their opinions can never repay their debts.
—George Savile, 1st Marquess of Halifax (1633–95) British Statesman, Writer, Politician
All power, even the most despotic, rests ultimately on opinion.
—David Hume (1711–76) Scottish Philosopher, Historian
One of the mistakes in the conduct of human life is to suppose that other men’s opinions are to make us happy.
—Richard Burton (1925–84) Welsh Actor
I could never divide myself from any man upon the difference of opinion be angry with his judgment for not agreeing in that from which, within a few days, I might dissent myself.
—Thomas Browne (1605–82) English Author, Physician
This is the true joy in life: Being used for a purpose recognized by yourself as a mighty one, being a force of nature instead of a feverish, selfish little clod of ailments and grievances, complaining that the world will not devote itself to making you happy. I am of the opinion that my life belongs to the whole community and as long as I live, it is my privilege to do for it what I can. It is a sort of splendid torch which I have got hold of for the moment and I want to make it burn as brightly as possible before handing it on to future generations.
—George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950) Irish Playwright
No one can have a higher opinion of him than I have; and I think he’s a dirty little beast.
—W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) English Dramatist, Librettist, Poet, Illustrator
The public buys its opinions as it buys its meat, or takes in its milk, on the principle that it is cheaper to do this than to keep a cow. So it is, but the milk is more likely to be watered.
—Samuel Butler
The proof of gold is fire.
—Common Proverb
Fly no opinion because it is new, but strictly search, and after careful view, reject it if false, embrace it if ’tis true.
—Lucretius (c.99–55 BCE) Roman Epicurean Poet, Philosopher
Every man has a right to be wrong in his opinions. But no man has a right to be wrong in his facts.
—Bernard M. Baruch (1870–1965) American Financier, Economic Consultant
Even good opinions are worth very little unless we hold them in the broad, intelligent, and spacious way.
—John Morley, 1st Viscount Morley of Blackburn (1838–1923) British Political Leader, Writer, Editor, Journalist
Popular opinion is the greatest lie in the world.
—Thomas Carlyle (1795–1881) Scottish Historian, Essayist
A man’s opinions are generally of much more value than his arguments.
—Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (1809–94) American Physician, Essayist
That was excellently observed, say I, when I read a passage in an author, where his opinion agrees with mine. When we differ, there I pronounce him to be mistaken.
—Jonathan Swift (1667–1745) Irish Satirist
Few people are capable of expressing with equanimity opinions which differ from the prejudices of their social environment. Most people are even incapable of forming such opinions.
—Albert Einstein (1879–1955) German-born Physicist