Top 371 Quotes & Sayings by Lewis Carroll - Page 3

If there's no meaning in it," said the King, "that saves a world of trouble, you know, as we needn't try to find any. And yet I don't know," he went on [...]; "I seem to see some meaning in them, after all.

Well that was the silliest tea party I ever went to! I am never going back there again!

Cheshire Cat: If I were looking for a white rabbit, I'd ask the Mad Hatter. Alice: The Mad Hatter? Oh, no no no... Cheshire Cat: Or, you could ask the March Hare, in that direction. Alice: Oh, thank you. I think I'll see him... Cheshire Cat: Of course, he's mad, too. Alice: But I don't want to go among mad people. Cheshire Cat: Oh, you can't help that. Most everyone's mad here. [laughs maniacally; starts to disappear] Cheshire Cat: You may have noticed that I'm not all there myself.

May we not then sometimes define insanity as an inability to distinguish which is the waking and which the sleeping life? We often dream without the least suspicion of unreality: 'Sleep hath its own world', and it is often as lifelike as the other.

I wish I hadn't cried so much!” said Alice, as she swam about, trying to find her way out. I shall be punished for it now, I suppose, by being drowned in my own tears !

Well, "slithy" means "lithe and slimy." "Lithe" is the same as "active." You see it's like a portmanteau - there are two meanings packed up into one word.

Alice had got so much into the way of expecting nothing but out-of-the-way things to happen, that it seemed quite dull and stupid for life to go on in the common way.

You may charge me with murder--or want of sense-- (We are all of us weak at times): But the slightest approach to a false pretence Was never among my crimes!

Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?" "That depends a good deal on where you want to get to." "I don't much care where –" "Then it doesn't matter which way you go.

burning with curiosity

You evidently do not suffer from "quotation-hunger" as I do! I get all the dictionaries of quotations I can meet with, as I always want to know where a quotation comes from.

She's in that state of mind that she wants to deny SOMETHING only she doesn't know what to deny!

Who sail on stormy seas; And that's the way I get my bread -- A trifle, if you please.

"All right", said the Cat; and this time it vanished quite slowly, beginning with the end of the tail, and ending with the grin, which remained some time after the rest of it had gone.

Beware the Jabberwock, my son The jaws that bite, the claws that catch! Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun The frumious Bandersnatch!

I am fond of children - except boys.

Soup of the evening, beautiful soup! Soup of the evening, beautiful soup! Beau--ootiful Soo--oop! Beau--ootiful Soo--oop! Soo--oop of the e--e--evening, Beautiful, beautiful soup!

He was part of my dream, of course -- but then I was part of his dream, too.

I said you LOOKED like an egg, Sir. And some eggs are very pretty, you know.

So young a child ought to know which way she's going, even if she doesn't know her own name!

It is a very inconvenient habit of kittens (Alice had once made the remark) that, whatever you say to them, they always purr: "If they would only purr for 'yes,' and mew for 'no,; or any rule of that sort," she had said, "so that one could keep up a conversation! But how can you talk with a person if they always say the same thing?

It's too late to correct it: when you've once said a thing, that fixes it, and you must take the consequences.

Speak roughly to your little boy and beat him when he sneezes! he only does it to annoy, because he knows it teases!

"Take some more tea," the March Hare said to Alice, very earnestly. "I've had nothing yet," Alice replied in an offended tone, "so I can't take more."

I'll try if I know all the things I used to know. Let me see: four times five is twelve, and four times six is thirteen, and four times seven is - oh dear! I shall never get to twenty at that rate!

Lastly, she pictured to herself how this same little sister of hers would, in the after-time, be herself a grown woman; and how she would keep, through all her riper years, the simple and loving heart of her childhood: and how she would gather about her other little children, and make their eyes bright and eager with many a strange tale, perhaps even with the dream of Wonderland of long ago: and how she would feel with all their simple sorrows, and find a pleasure in all their simple joys, remembering her own child-life, and the happy summer days.

It takes all the running you can do just to keep in the same place.

I'm getting rather hoarse, I fear, After so much reciting: So, if you don't object, my dear, We'll try a glass of bitter beer - I think it looks inviting.

A tale begun in other days, When summer suns were glowing - A simple chime, that served to time The rhythm of your rowing - Whose echoes live in memory yet, Though envious years would say 'forget.

"I could have done it in a much more complicated way," said the Red Queen, immensely proud.

There ought to be a book written about me, that there ought!

Thy loving smile will surely hail The love-gift of a fairy tale.

It'll be no use their putting their heads down and saying "Come up again, dear!" I shall only look up and say "Who am I then? Tell me that first, and then, if I like being that person, I'll come up: if not, I'll stay down here till I'm somebody else"--but, oh dear!' cried Alice, with a sudden burst of tears, 'I do wish they WOULD put their heads down! I am so VERY tired of being all alone here!

When all has been considered, it seems to me to be the irresistible intuition that infinite punishment for finite sin would be unjust, and therefore wrong. We feel that even weak and erring Man would shrink from such an act. And we cannot conceive of God as acting on a lower standard of right and wrong.

You could not see a cloud, because No cloud was in the sky: No birds were flying overhead - There were no birds to fly.

And if he left off dreaming about you, where do you suppose you'd be?

My hand moves because certain forces--electric, magnetic, or whatever 'nerve-force' may prove to be--are impressed on it by my brain. This nerve-force, stored in the brain, would probably be traceable, if Science were complete, to chemical forces supplied to the brain by the blood, and ultimately derived from the food I eat and the air I breathe.

Soup of the evening, beautiful Soup!

Here is a golden Rule.... Write legibly. The average temper of the human race would be perceptibly sweetened, if everybody obeyedthis Rule!

Humpty Dumpty sat on the wall Humpty Dumpty had a great fall All the king's horses and all the king's men Couldn't put Humpty together again

The further off from England the nearer is to France- Then turn not pale, beloved snail, but come and join the dance.

Of all things, I do like a Conspiracy! It's so interesting!

Well! I've often seen a cat without a grin,' thought Alice 'but a grin without a cat! It's the most curious thing i ever saw in my life!

It was for bringing the cook tulip-roots instead of onions.

Can you row?" the Sheep asked, handing her a pair of knitting-needles as she spoke. "Yes, a little--but not on land--and not with needles--" Alice was beginning to say.

I wish I could manage to be glad! Only I never can remember the rule. You must be very happy, living in this wood, and being glad whenever you like!

O Oysters,' said the Carpenter, You've had a pleasant run! Shall we be trotting home again?' But answer came there none - And this was scarcely odd, because They'd eaten every one.

Be sure the safest rule is that we should not dare to live in any scene in which we dare not die.

Epithets, like pepper, Give zest to what you write; And if you strew them sparely, They whet the appetite: But if you lay them on too thick, You spoil the matter quite!

Why is a raven like a writing desk?

Who can tell whether the parallelogram, which in our ignorance we have defined and drawn, and the whole of whose properties we profess to know, may not be all the while panting for exterior angles, sympathetic with the interior, or sullenly repining at the fact that it cannot be inscribed in a circle?

I don't think..." then you shouldn't talk, said the Hatter.

For, you see, so many out-of-the-way things had happened lately, that Alice had begun to think that very few things indeed were really impossible.

I believe this thought, of the possibility of death - if calmly realised, and steadily faced would be one of the best possible tests as to our going to any scene of amusement being right or wrong. If the thought of sudden death acquires, for you, a special horror when imagined as happening in a theatre, then be very sure the theatre is harmful for you, however harmless it may be for others; and that you are incurring a deadly peril in going.

One of the deepest motives (as you are aware) in the human beast (so deep that many have failed to detect it) is Alliteration.

It is a very inconvenient habit of kittens (Alice had once made the remark) that whatever you say to them, they always purr.

Must a name mean something?" Alice asked doubtfully. Of course it must," Humpty Dumpty said with a short laugh; "my name means the shape I am - and a good handsome shape it is, too. With a name like yours, you might be any shape, almost.

Now, here, you see, it takes all the running you can do, to keep in the same place. If you want to get somewhere else, you must run at least twice as fast as that!

When I use a word,’ Humpty Dumpty said in rather a scornful tone, ‘it means just what I choose it to mean — neither more nor less.’ ’The question is,’ said Alice, ‘whether you can make words mean so many different things.’ ’The question is,’ said Humpty Dumpty, ‘which is to be master — that’s all.

"She can't do Subtraction." said the White Queen. "Can you do Division? Divide a loaf by a knife-what's the answer to that?" "I suppose-" Alice was beginning, but the Red Queen answered for her. "Bread-and-butter, of course."