# What is the greatest sentence you have read or heard ? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [January 12, 2014, 6:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-greatest-sentence-you-have-read-or-heard/678598 "2014-01-12T18:47:35Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 7
**Author:** ![Kenm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/bc79bd/32.png) [@Kenm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kenm)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2014, 6:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-greatest-sentence-you-have-read-or-heard/678598/122 "2014-01-24T18:42:33Z")
> [@gigi](#): > > Excellent choice. So far this is topping anything I can think of! E = mc[sup]2[/sup] ---
**Author:** ![Merejane](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a6a055/32.png) [@Merejane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Merejane)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2014, 7:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-greatest-sentence-you-have-read-or-heard/678598/123 "2014-01-24T19:22:48Z")
> [@](#): > > “Jesus wept.” (John 11:35, from the story of Lazarus) So sad, so succinct. “But he never laughed.” (My Government 101 professor in college.) ---
**Author:** ![Washoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/ecae2f/32.png) [@Washoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Washoe)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2014, 7:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-greatest-sentence-you-have-read-or-heard/678598/124 "2014-01-24T19:30:02Z")
What happens now? I’ll tell you what happens now. Your scumbag brother-in-law is finished. Done. You understand? I will _own_ him, when this is over. Every cent he earns, every cent his wife earns, is mine. Every place he goes, anywhere he turns, I’m gonna be there, grabbing my share. He’ll be scrubbing toilets in Tijuana for pennies, and I’ll be standing over him, taking my cut. He’ll see me when he wakes up in the morning, and when he crawls to sleep in whatever rat hole is left for him after I shred his house down. I will haunt his crusty ass forever, until the day he sticks a gun up his mouth and pulls the trigger, just to get me out of his head. That’s what happens next. ---
**Author:** ![Merejane](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a6a055/32.png) [@Merejane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Merejane)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2014, 7:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-greatest-sentence-you-have-read-or-heard/678598/125 "2014-01-24T19:32:33Z")
The last line of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s _The Great Gatsby_: “So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back carelessly into the past.” ---
**Author:** ![StusBlues](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/dc4da7/32.png) [@StusBlues](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/StusBlues)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2014, 7:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-greatest-sentence-you-have-read-or-heard/678598/126 "2014-01-24T19:37:14Z")
> [@Jungian\_Camisole](#): > > “It stops being funny when it starts being you.” > > Stephen King. Good lesson in empathy. > > “Stay on the streets of this town and they’ll be carving you up alright.” > > Bruce Springsteen. This song changed my life. Long and boring story, but I give him all of the credit for lighting a fire under my ass to improve my situation. It’s worked out very, very well. 🙂 “It ain’t no sin to be glad you’re alive.” ---
**Author:** ![DCnDC](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dcndc/32/2842_2.png) [@DCnDC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DCnDC)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2014, 7:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-greatest-sentence-you-have-read-or-heard/678598/127 "2014-01-24T19:45:21Z")
“I’m in a world of shit, yes… but I am alive, and I am not afraid.” -Private Joker, _Full Metal Jacket_ Words I’ve lived my whole life by. ---
**Author:** ![gigi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/a587f6/32.png) [@gigi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gigi)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2014, 7:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-greatest-sentence-you-have-read-or-heard/678598/128 "2014-01-24T19:57:14Z")
> [@Sattua](#): > > Just because I like the sound of it… and because it makes you think about deep stuff, Clarence’s dream from Richard III: If poetry counts: honour corruption villainy holiness riding in fragrance of sunlight(side by side all in a singing wonder of blossoming yes riding)to him who died that death should be dead humblest and proudest eagerly wandering (equally all alive in miraculous day) merrily moving through sweet forgiveness of spring (over the under the gift of the earth of the sky knight and ploughman pardoner wife and nun merchant frere clerk somnour miller and reve and geoffrey and all)come up from the never of when come into the now of forever come riding alive down while crylessly drifting through vast most nothing’s own nothing children go of dust -e e cummings {Excuse my posting this one again – on my mom’s gravestone:} In a flash, at a trumpet crash, I am all at once what Christ is, since he was what I am, and this Jack, joke, poor potsherd, patch, matchwood, immortal diamond, Is immortal diamond. - Gerard Manley Hopkins ---
**Author:** ![Crazy\_Canuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crazy_canuck/32/5282_2.png) [@Crazy\_Canuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crazy_Canuck)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2014, 8:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-greatest-sentence-you-have-read-or-heard/678598/129 "2014-01-24T20:09:42Z")
The last line of this, quoted in full for context. “Many that live deserve death. And some that die deserve life. Can you give it to them? Then do not be too eager to deal out death in judgement, for even the very wise cannot see all ends.” - Gandalf the Grey in The Fellowship of the Ring ---
**Author:** ![kayaker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kayaker/32/441_2.png) [@kayaker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kayaker)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2014, 8:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-greatest-sentence-you-have-read-or-heard/678598/130 "2014-01-24T20:26:09Z")
“He thrusts his fists against the posts and still insists he sees the ghosts” Stephen King/Curt Siodmak * * * “When you hear sweet syncopation And the music softly moans T’ain’t no sin to take off your skin And dance around in your bones” Tom Waits ---
**Author:** ![Rocketeer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rocketeer/32/4437_2.png) [@Rocketeer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rocketeer)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2014, 9:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-greatest-sentence-you-have-read-or-heard/678598/131 "2014-01-24T21:09:58Z")
> [@Merejane](#): > > The last line of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s _The Great Gatsby_: > > “So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back carelessly into the past.” Isn’t it “ceaselessly”? ---
**Author:** ![sweeteviljesus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/898d66/32.png) [@sweeteviljesus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sweeteviljesus)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2014, 10:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-greatest-sentence-you-have-read-or-heard/678598/132 "2014-01-24T22:02:44Z")
And lo, I beheld a pale horse, and his rider’s name was Death, and Hell followed with him. This is not the end, it is not even the beginning of the end, but it may be the end of the beginning. We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the drugs began to take effect. ---
**Author:** ![Merejane](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a6a055/32.png) [@Merejane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Merejane)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2014, 7:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-greatest-sentence-you-have-read-or-heard/678598/133 "2014-01-25T07:15:02Z")
> [@Rocketeer](#): > > Isn’t it “ceaselessly”? Oh, arrgh, yes, it is! I love the sentence, but don’t have it memorized, so I did a google search and copied and pasted it from somewhere. It did not occur to me that it would be worded incorrectly, and clearly I did not spot that mistake! I’m so frustrated, because the word “ceaselessly” is so important to the sentence. Sigh! So let me try one more time: The last line of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s _The Great Gatsby_: “So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.” ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2014, 10:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-greatest-sentence-you-have-read-or-heard/678598/134 "2014-01-25T10:19:26Z")
“From this distant vantage point, the Earth might not seem of any particular interest. But for us, it’s different. Look again at that dot. That’s here. That’s home. That’s us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every “superstar,” every “supreme leader,” every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there-on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam." - From: _Pale Blue Dot_. -By **Carl Sagan**. > **[Pale Blue Dot](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pale_Blue_Dot)** > > Pale Blue Dot is a photograph of planet Earth taken on February 14, 1990, by the Voyager 1 space probe from a record distance of about 6 billion kilometers (3.7 billion miles, 40.5 AU), as part of that day's Family Portrait series of images of the Solar System. > In the photograph, Earth's apparent size is less than a pixel; the planet appears as a tiny dot against the vastness of space, among bands of sunlight reflected by the camera. I like the whole book/documentary, but specially this part: “The Earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that in glory and triumph they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot.” ---
**Author:** ![wolf\_meister](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wolf_meister/32/15202_2.png) [@wolf\_meister](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wolf_meister)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2014, 11:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-greatest-sentence-you-have-read-or-heard/678598/135 "2014-01-25T11:16:03Z")
From “Pale Blue Dot” - Dr. Carl Sagan pondered philosophically on a photo of the Earth taken by Voyager 1 from a distance of 6.1 billion kilometers (3.8 billion miles) - roughly the distance of Neptune. > [@](#): > > Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that in glory and triumph they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot. ---
**Author:** ![WreckingCrew](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wreckingcrew/32/4080_2.png) [@WreckingCrew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WreckingCrew)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2014, 4:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-greatest-sentence-you-have-read-or-heard/678598/136 "2014-01-25T16:26:28Z")
As merciful blackness closed in, I was on my hands and knees, bunting the infernal thing along with my nose and whinnying, “Roll, confound you, roll!” - S.J. Perelman It concerns the building of a children’s toy. ---
**Author:** ![Musky\_Moon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/90db22/32.png) [@Musky\_Moon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Musky_Moon)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2014, 7:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-greatest-sentence-you-have-read-or-heard/678598/137 "2014-01-25T19:03:07Z")
From a recent Cracked article: “In terms of disappointment and betrayal, _Mac and Me_ is the cinematic equivalent of Santa Claus delivering you a View-Master containing footage of your eventual death.” ---
**Author:** ![Zeldar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/b77776/32.png) [@Zeldar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zeldar)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2014, 7:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-greatest-sentence-you-have-read-or-heard/678598/138 "2014-01-25T19:09:40Z")
> [@Musky\_Moon](#): > > From a recent Cracked article: > > “In terms of disappointment and betrayal, _Mac and Me_ is the cinematic equivalent of Santa Claus delivering you a View-Master containing footage of your eventual death.” Righteous! And cold! ---
**Author:** ![The\_Tooth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c67d28/32.png) [@The\_Tooth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Tooth)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2014, 7:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-greatest-sentence-you-have-read-or-heard/678598/139 "2014-01-25T19:10:33Z")
The difficulties of transporting wine over interstellar distances are manifold. ---
**Author:** ![Enterprise](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/76d3ee/32.png) [@Enterprise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Enterprise)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2014, 8:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-greatest-sentence-you-have-read-or-heard/678598/140 "2014-01-25T20:02:34Z")
“It was the afternoon of my eighty-first birthday, and I was in bed with my catamite when Ali announced that the archbishop had come to see me.” The opening sentence of Anthony Burgess’s–ever after that line great, too–_Earthly Powers_. Brilliant on so many levels. ---
**Author:** ![Steve\_MB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steve_mb/32/5339_2.png) [@Steve\_MB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steve_MB)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2014, 8:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-greatest-sentence-you-have-read-or-heard/678598/141 "2014-01-25T20:44:10Z")
“Overhead, without any fuss, the stars were going out.” –Arthur C. Clarke, _The Nine Billion Names Of God_ [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-greatest-sentence-you-have-read-or-heard/678598.md?page=6) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-greatest-sentence-you-have-read-or-heard/678598.md?page=8)