Theme

Philosophy quotes about truth

Truth is among philosophy’s oldest problems: what it is for a claim to be true, and how truth relates to belief, language, and power.

Why this theme matters

Correspondence, coherence, pragmatist, and deflationary theories compete. Ethics and politics ask who gets to define truth in public life.

In the history of philosophy

From Plato and Aristotle through medieval adequation, modern epistemology, and Nietzschean suspicion, truth remains both ideal and contested.

Thinkers in this collection

René Descartes , William James , Giambattista Vico , Maimonides , Augustine of Hippo , G. W. F. Hegel , Plato , Henry David Thoreau

Frequently asked questions

What is truth in philosophy?

A leading idea is that truth is what our statements must track about reality—though theories disagree on the details.

Is truth relative?

Some views relativize truth to frameworks or cultures; others defend objectivity while admitting fallibility.

Where are philosophy quotes about truth?

This page collects verified English passages on truth, appearance, and honesty in inquiry.

  1. Once in a lifetime, everything must be doubted.
  2. The things we conceive very clearly and very distinctly are all true.
  3. Truth happens to an idea. It becomes true, is made true by events.
  4. The true is precisely what is made.
  5. Accept the truth from whatever source it comes.
  6. Do not go outside; return into yourself. Truth dwells in the inner man.
  7. The true is the whole.
  8. Every human soul has by nature beheld the things that are.
  9. The true is thus the Bacchanalian revel in which no member is not drunk.
  10. Rather than love, than money, than fame, give me truth.
  11. Truth does not contradict truth; rather it agrees with it and bears witness to it.
  12. The true is the name of whatever proves itself to be good in the way of belief.
  13. The Good… is to be honored still more highly than knowledge and truth.
  14. We are not free to say that just anything is the subject of a moral belief.
  15. Solitude became for him a ladder: withdrawing from the senses, he turned inward toward the Truth.
  16. A theory of truth is not of any real universal significance unless it offers some account of the notion of being so.
  17. The thought of an African sage, even if he purports to be the spokesman for a group, is not necessarily that of all the individuals in that group, and still less that of all Africans in general.
  18. Relativism of that sort isn't a way to encourage conversation; it's just a reason to fall silent.
  19. There is no one word in Akan for truth.