Sayings about Books
A book is like a garden carried in the pocket. ~ Arabian Proverb
Books and friends should be few but good.~ Traditional Proverb
If a fool borrows a book cut off his hand; but cut off both hands of the fool who brings it back. ~ Iranian Proverb
See to it that you have many books and many friends — but be sure they are good ones. ~ Spanish Proverbs
When you have read a book for the first time, you get to know a friend; read it for a second time and you meet an old friend. ~ Chinese Proverb
Teachers die, but books live on. ~ Dutch Proverbs
Better than the ignorant are those who read books; better still are those who retain what they read; even better are those who understand it; the best of all are those who go to work. ~ Indian Proverb
There’s no thief like a bad book. ~ Italian Proverbs
Every age has its book. ~ Arabian Proverb
Knowledge without wisdom is a load of books on the back of an ass. ~ Japanese Proverbs
Old truths, old laws, old friends, old books, and old wine are best. ~ Polish Proverbs
Borrowed wives, like borrowed books, are seldom returned. ~ American Proverb
Reading books removes sorrows from the heart. ~ Moroccan Proverb
A good book praises itself. ~ German Proverbs
The world is the book of women. ~ French Proverb
The sight of books removes sorrows from the heart.~ African Proverb
Every book must be chewed to get out its juice. ~ Chinese Proverb
It is better to be without a book than to believe it entirely. ~ Chinese Proverb
Unread books make hollow minds. ~ Chinese Proverb
Beware of a man of one book. ~ English Proverb
A wicked book cannot repent. ~ Traditional Proverb
Scholars talk books, butchers talk pigs. ~ Chinese Proverb
Don’t judge a book by its cover. ~ English Proverbs
Walls are the notebooks of fools. ~ Arabian Proverb
A pack of cards is the devil’s prayer book. ~ German Proverbs
Whoever writes a book, should be ready to accept criticism. ~ Iraqi Proverb
Years know more than books. ~ American Proverb
A donkey that carries a lot of books is not necessarily learned. ~ Danish Proverbs
A wise man without a book is like a workman with no tools. ~ Moroccan Proverbs
A book is a good friend when it lays bare the errors of the past. ~ Indian Proverbs
A man is happy when he has books, but happier still when he does not need them. ~ Chinese Proverb
It is better to be entirely without a book than to believe it entirely. ~ Chinese Proverb
The more sins you confess, the more books you will sell. ~ American Proverbs
If your books are not read, your descendants will be ignorant. ~ Chinese Proverb
Quotations about Books
Good books are true friends. ~ Francis Bacon
Books let us into their souls and lay open to us the secrets of our own. ~ William Hazlitt
Begin to read a book that will help you move toward your dream. ~ Les Brown
Let your bookcases and your shelves be your gardens and your pleasure-grounds. Pluck the fruit that grows therein, gather the roses, the spices, and the myrrh. ~ Judah Ibn Tibbon
Bread of flour is good; but there is bread, sweet as honey, if we would eat it, in a good book. ~ John Ruskin
‘Tis the good reader that makes the good book. ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson Quotes
He who loveth a book will never want a faithful friend, a wholesome counsellor, a cheerful companion, or an effectual comforter. ~ Isaac Barrow
If there’s a book you really want to read but it hasn’t been written yet, then you must write it. ~ Toni Morrison
Good friends, good books and a sleepy conscience: this is the ideal life. ~ Mark Twain
The multitude of books is making us ignorant. ~ Voltaire
The best books are those which lift us to a higher plane where we breathe a purer atmosphere. ~ Orison Swett Marden
That is a good book which is opened with expectation and closed with profit. ~ Amos Bronson Alcott
Never judge a book by its movie. ~ J. W. Eagan
No one who can read, ever looks at a book, even unopened on a shelf, like one who cannot. ~ Charles Dickens Quotes
There is no such thing as a moral or immoral book; books are well written or badly written. ~ Oscar Wilde Quotes
Books support us in our solitude and keep us from being a burden to ourselves. ~ Jeremy Collier
There’s nothing wrong with reading a book you love over and over. When you do, the words get inside you, become a part of you, in a way that words in a book you’ve read only once can’t. ~ Gail Carson Levine
Except a living man there is nothing more wonderful than a book! A message to us from the dead, – from human souls whom we never saw, who lived perhaps thousands of miles away; and yet these, on those little sheets of paper, speak to us, teach us, comfort us, open their hearts to us as brothers. ~ Charles Kingsley
Books are men of higher stature; the only men that speak aloud for future times to hear. ~ E.S. Barrett
A book is a garden; a book is an orchard; a book is a storehouse; a book is a party. It is company by the way; it is a counselor; it is a multitude of counselors. ~ Henry Ward Beecher
A book is a garden, an orchard, a storehouse, a party, a company by the way, a counselor, and a multitude of counselors. ~ Henry Ward Beecher
In books lies the soul of the whole Past Time; the articulate audible voice of the Past, when the body and material substance of it has altogether vanished like a dream. ~ Thomas Carlyle
Reading useless books is like sowing bad seed–your trouble does not reward you. ~ Edward Counsel
That is a good book which is opened with expectation, and closed with delight and profit. ~ Amos Bronson Alcott
A good book has no ending. ~ R.D. Cumming
A good book is fruitful of other books; it perpetuates its fame from age to age, and makes eras in the lives of its readers. ~ Amos Bronson Alcott
A house without books is like a room without windows. ~ Heinrich Mann
No man can be called friendless who has God and the companionship of good books. ~ Elizabeth Barrett Browning
Books are not made for furniture, but there is nothing else that so beautifully furnishes a house. ~ Henry Ward Beecher
Books are embalmed minds. ~ Christian Nestell Bovee
One must always be careful of books … and what is inside them, for words have the power to change us. ~ Cassandra Clare
The greatest advantage of books does not always come from what we remember of them, but from their suggestiveness. A good book often serves as a match to light the dormant power within us. ~ Orison Swett Marden
Books are not men and yet they stay alive. ~ Stephen Vincent Benet
Books are not made for furniture, but there is nothing else that so beautifully furnishes a house. ~ Henry Ward Beecher
Books are a uniquely portable magic. ~ Stephen King
The covers of this book are too far apart. ~ Ambrose Bierce
I would never read a book if it were possible for me to talk half an hour with the man who wrote it. ~ Woodrow Wilson
A good title is the title of a successful book. ~ Raymond Chandler
Books are the bees which carry the quickening pollen from one to another mind. ~ James Russell Lowell
The true University of these days is a collection of Books. ~ Thomas Carlyle
Books succeed, and lives fail. ~ Elizabeth Barrett Browning
He fed his spirit with the bread of books. ~ Edwin Markham
A book is like a money-changer: it pays you back in another form what you brint to it. ~ Austin O’Malley
There are worse crimes than burning books. One of them is not reading them. ~ Joseph Brodsky
You don’t have to burn books to destroy a culture. Just get people to stop reading them. ~ Ray Bradbury
The worth of a book is to be measured by what you can carry away from it. ~ James Bryce
A good book is the precious life-blood of a master spirit, embalmed and treasured up on purpose to a life beyond life. ~ John Milton
Books are the training weights of the mind. ~ Epictetus
Without books God is silent, justice dormant, natural science at a stand, philosophy lame, letters dumb, and all things involved in Cimmerian dark-ness. ~ Thomas Bartholin
Parents should leave books lying around marked “forbidden” if they want their children to read. ~ Doris Lessing
If you want to read a perfect book there is only one way: write it. ~ Ambrose Bierce
Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested. ~ Francis Bacon
Books can be dangerous. The best ones should be labeled “This could change your life.” ~ Helen Exley
You know you’ve read a good book when you turn the last page and feel a little as if you have lost a friend. ~ Paul Sweeney
The world has been printing books for 450 years, and yet gunpowder still has a wider circulation. Never mind! Printer’s ink is the greater explosive: it will win. ~ Christopher Morley
A real book is not one that we read, but one that reads us. ~ W. H. Auden
The reading of a fine book is an uninterrupted dialogue in which the book speaks and our soul replies. ~ Andre Maurois
Books, like bricks, depend upon each other for support. ~ Edward Counsel
A good book is the purest essence of a human soul. ~ Thomas Carlyle
But of what use will my book be when it is finished? ~ James Boswell
I always assume that a good book is more intelligent than its author. It can say things that the writer is not aware of. ~ Umberto Eco
Books are true friends that will never flatter nor dissemble: be you but true to yourself, and you shall need no other comfort. ~ Francis Bacon
Where is human nature so weak as in the bookstore? ~ Henry Ward Beecher
Many books require no thought from those who read them, and for a very simple reason–they made no such demand upon those who wrote them. ~ Charles Caleb Colton
There are books of which the backs and covers are by far the best parts. ~ Charles Dickens Quotes
A book may be compared to your neighbor: if it be good, it cannot last too long; if bad, you cannot get rid of it too early. ~ Rupert Brooke
No one ever reads a book. He reads himself through books. ~ Romain Rolland
If you only read the books that everyone else is reading, you can only think what everyone else is thinking. ~ Haruki Murakami
Books are my friends, my companions. They make me laugh and cry and find meaning in life. ~ Christopher Paolini
