The Case-Book Of Sherlock Holmes Quotes
"It can't hurt now," was Mr. Sherlock Holmes's comment when, for the tenth time in as many years, I asked his leave to reveal the following narrative.
"It may be some fussy, self-important fool; it may be a matter of life and death," said he as he handed me the note. "I know no more than this message tells me."
"Well, I can tell you a little more than that. He has rather a reputation for arranging delicate matters which are to be kept out of the papers."
"Frankness shone from his gray Irish eyes, and good humor played round his mobile, smiling lips."
"His collaboration may be very necessary, for we are dealing on this occasion, Mr. Holmes, with a man to whom violence is familiar and who will, literally, stick at nothing."
"If your man is more dangerous than the late Professor Moriarty, or than the living Colonel Sebastian Moran, then he is indeed worth meeting."
"To revenge crime is important, but to prevent it is more so."
"The strongest of all holds where a woman is concerned – the hold of love."
"She absolutely accepts his version and will listen to no other."
"He has a daughter, Violet de Merville, young, rich, beautiful, accomplished, a wonder-woman in every way."
"It is a terrible thing, Mr. Holmes, to see a dreadful event, an atrocious situation, preparing itself before your eyes, to clearly understand whither it will lead and yet to be utterly unable to avert it."
"His worst enemy couldn't say that of him. He can look after himself."
"He collects books and pictures. He is a man with a considerable artistic side to his nature."
"I'm easy to find," said the young woman. "Hell, London, gets me every time."
"Oh, if I could only pull him into the pit where he has pushed so many!"
"The sight of this would drive a real connoisseur wild."
"The effect upon my mind is exactly as predicted."
"Life is full of whimsical happenings, Watson."
"I am a brain, Watson. The rest of me is a mere appendix. Therefore, it is the brain I must consider."
"We all have neglected opportunities to deplore."
"When the other fellow has all the trumps, it saves time to throw down your hand."
"Even my limited sense of humor could evolve a better joke than that."
"I've cast my net and I have my fish. But I have not got the stone."
"No violence, gentlemen – no violence, I beg of you! Consider the furniture!"
"Every man finds his limitations, Mr. Holmes, but at least it cures us of the weakness of self-satisfaction."
"In that case, my dear sir, I shall be under the painful necessity of advising your arrest."
"The case is but half finished; the details can wait."
"Too intensely, Mr. Holmes. That was the ruin of him."
"For God's sake, give me some advice, for I am at my wit's end."
"Please God you may! If you will excuse me, gentlemen, I will go up to my wife's room and see if there has been any change."
"She verra ill. She need doctor. I frightened stay alone with her without doctor."
"He loves me. Yes. But do I not love him? Do I not love him even to sacrifice myself rather than break his dear heart?"
"He is full of grief, but he cannot understand."
"No, he cannot understand. But he should trust."
"I want my child. I have a right to my child."
"The child is safe with Mrs. Mason, and there he must remain."
"Oh, daddy, I did not know that you were due yet. I should have been here to meet you. Oh, I am so glad to see you!"
"Dear old chap," said he, patting the flaxen head with a very tender hand.
"Fancy anyone having the heart to hurt him," he muttered as he glanced down at the small, angry red pucker upon the cherub throat.
"Your anxiety will soon, I hope, be set at rest."
"Your wife is a very good, a very loving, and a very ill-used woman."
"It is certainly delicate," said my friend with an amused smile, "but I have not been struck up to now with its complexity."
"For heaven's sake, Holmes," he said hoarsely; "if you can see the truth in this matter, do not keep me in suspense."
"How could I tell you, Bob? I felt the blow it would be to you."
"I think a year at sea would be my prescription for Master Jacky," said Holmes, rising from his chair.
"This, I fancy, is the time for our exit, Watson," said Holmes in a whisper.
"Referring to your letter of the 19th, I beg to state that I have looked into the inquiry of your client, Mr. Robert Ferguson, of Ferguson and Muirhead, tea brokers, of Mincing Lane, and that the matter has been brought to a satisfactory conclusion."
"But there are the facts, Mr. Holmes. It is not a case in which we can consult the police, and yet we are utterly at our wit's end as to what to do, and we feel in some strange way that we are drifting towards disaster."
"The practical application of what I have said is very close to the problem which I am investigating. It is a tangled skein, you understand, and I am looking for a loose end. One possible loose end lies in the question: Why does Professor Presbury's wolfhound, Roy, endeavor to bite him?"
"It must have been daylight before he regained his room."
"I think, Watson, that our lot for the next few days might lie in less pleasant places."
"Compound of the Busy Bee and Excelsior. We can but try – the motto of the firm."
"I dare say it was twenty seconds or so that I lay paralyzed and watched the face. Then it vanished, but I could not – I could not spring out of bed and look out after it."
"Speaking as a medical man," said I, "it appears to be a case for an alienist. The old gentleman's cerebral processes were disturbed by the love affair."
"My dear young lady, you say that your room is on the second floor. Is there a long ladder in the garden?"
"But, dear me, Watson, he is surely at our heels. The villain still pursues us."
"I am so sorry, Mr. Holmes. I wished to apologize."
"My dear sir, there is no need. It is all in the way of professional experience."
"Too clear!" said Holmes. "That was my miscalculation."
"A little patience, Mr. Bennett. Things will soon develop."
"The highest type of man may revert to the animal if he leaves the straight road of destiny."
"Consider, Watson, that the material, the sensual, the worldly would all prolong their worthless lives."
"It was a most singular thing that a problem which was certainly as abstruse and unusual as any which I have faced in my long professional career should have come to me after my retirement."
"My mind is like a crowded box-room with packets of all sorts stowed away therein."
"It is not reasonable to suppose that every one of these cases gave Holmes the opportunity of showing those curious gifts of instinct and observation."
"The most terrible human tragedies were often involved in those cases which brought him the fewest personal opportunities."
"Lord bless you, Mr. Holmes, she is that anxious to see you that you might bring the whole parish at your heels!"
"And I wish to God I had not!" said Mrs. Merrilow.
"You could not have a quieter lodger, or one who gives less trouble."
"For God's sake, not the police!" says she, "and the clergy can't change what is past."
"Mine stands well back from the road and is more private than most."
"The ways of fate are indeed hard to understand. If there is not some compensation hereafter, then the world is a cruel jest."
"I also have a question to ask you, Sir Robert," he said in his sternest tone. "Who is this? And what is it doing here?"
"Pathetic and futile. But is not all life pathetic and futile?"
"We reach. We grasp. And what is left in our hands at the end? A shadow. Or worse than a shadow – misery."
"I confess I don't see that I can be of much service, but I am willing to do my best."
"One must do something to ease an aching heart."
"No short cuts, Josiah Amberley. Things must be done decently and in order."
"Pure swank! He felt so clever and so sure of himself that he imagined no one could touch him."
"Whatever you do, see that he really does go."
"You can file it in our archives, Watson. Some day the true story may be told."
"The remarkable acumen by which Inspector MacKinnon deduced from the smell of paint that some other smell, that of gas, for example, might be concealed."
"We must forgive you your 'even,' Mr. Holmes."
"He was painting the passage. But he had already painted the door and woodwork of this room I spoke of."
"The bodies cannot be far away. Try the cellars and the garden."