Henrik Ibsen Lying Quotations

Don't use that foreign word 'ideals.' We have that excellent native word 'lies.'

If I cannot be myself in what I write, then the whole is nothing but lies and humbug.

What sort of truths are they that the majority usually supports? They are truths that are of such advanced age that they are beginning to break up. And if a truth is as old as that, it is also in a fair way to become a lie, gentlemen.

I am in revolt against the age-old lie that the majority is always right.

I'm plotting revolution against this lie that the majority has a monopoly of the truth. What are these truths that always bring the majority rallying round? Truths so elderly they are practically senile. And when a truth is as old as that, gentlemen, you can hardly tell it from a lie.

In great memories there lies the seed of growth.

The costliness of keeping friends does not lie in what one does for them, but in what one, out of consideration for them, refrains from doing.

I propose to raise a revolution against the lie that the majority has the monopoly of the truth.

There is so much falsehood both at home and at school. At home one must not speak, and at school we have to stand and tell lies to the children.

It is no use lying to one's self.

The majority is never right. Never, I tell you! That's one of these lies in society that no free and intelligent man can help rebelling against. Who are the people that make up the biggest proportion of the population -- the intelligent ones or the fools?

Take the life-lie away from the average man and straight away you take away his happiness.