# Who said it? **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [June 29, 2014, 3:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-said-it/691911 "2014-06-29T03:09:33Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Cerridwyn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f05b48/32.png) [@Cerridwyn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cerridwyn)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2014, 3:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-said-it/691911/1 "2014-06-29T03:09:33Z")
_ **"Whatever you are, be a good one."** _ Abraham Lincoln 16th president of US (1809 - 1865) Post your favorite quote by an actual person. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2014, 3:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-said-it/691911/2 "2014-06-29T03:21:38Z")
How about checking first to ensure that it is an \*actual \*quote by an actual person? [http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2012/09/08/did-abraham-lincoln-actually-say-that-obama-quote.html](http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2012/09/08/did-abraham-lincoln-actually-say-that-obama-quote.html) > [@](#): > > “Whatever you are, be a good one,” Joe Biden and countless others have said, attributing the quotation to Springfield’s finest, despite similarly scant evidence that those words, in that order, ever passed Lincoln’s lips. Oh well. It’s the thought that counts. It also appears on this [Lincoln quote debunking](http://rogerjnorton.com/Lincoln56.html) page and [this one](http://www.greatamericanhistory.net/lincolnneversaidthat.htm). Wrong forum too. ---
**Author:** ![Becky2844](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/91b2a8/32.png) [@Becky2844](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Becky2844)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2014, 3:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-said-it/691911/3 "2014-06-29T03:43:32Z")
Other than that…good topic. I have several pinned to my bulletin board above my desk but my favorite is Winston Churchill’s “Never give up! Never give up! Never give up!” ---
**Author:** ![Gatopescado](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gatopescado/32/5711_2.png) [@Gatopescado](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gatopescado)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2014, 3:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-said-it/691911/4 "2014-06-29T03:44:00Z")
Tough crowd! Here’s one from my Dad: “Do _something_, even if it’s wrong!” ---
**Author:** ![Zeldar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/b77776/32.png) [@Zeldar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zeldar)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2014, 3:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-said-it/691911/5 "2014-06-29T03:55:01Z")
> [@Becky2844](#): > > Other than that…good topic. I have several pinned to my bulletin board above my desk but my favorite is Winston Churchill’s “Never give up! Never give up! Never give up!” From [this page](http://thinkexist.com/quotation/simplify-simplify-/145742.html) is a perplexing quote of Thoreau’s > [@](#): > > “Simplify, simplify.” > Henry David Thoreau quotes (American Essayist, Poet and Philosopher, 1817-1862) There’s the possibility that he was heavily into Irony at the time. ---
**Author:** ![Becky2844](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/91b2a8/32.png) [@Becky2844](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Becky2844)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2014, 4:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-said-it/691911/6 "2014-06-29T04:11:55Z")
To **Zeldar**. Considering he was living in a friend’s place on Walden Pond and his mother left his supper on the doorstep every night, may be. 😛 But I have one of his quotes on my bulletin board, too: “The cost of a thing is the amount of what I will call life which is required to be exchanged for it, immediately, or in the long run.” So he was consistent and mulling over acquisitions, apparently. But when considering an impulse buy it always makes me ask his paraphrased question To dust or not to dust? _That_ is the question. ---
**Author:** ![engineer\_comp\_geek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/engineer_comp_geek/32/504_2.png) [@engineer\_comp\_geek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/engineer_comp_geek)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2014, 12:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-said-it/691911/7 "2014-06-29T12:12:33Z")
“The problem with internet quotes is that you cant always depend on their accuracy” -Abraham Lincoln ---
**Author:** ![Zeldar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/b77776/32.png) [@Zeldar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zeldar)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2014, 12:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-said-it/691911/8 "2014-06-29T12:42:39Z")
> [@Becky2844](#): > > To **Zeldar**. Considering he was living in a friend’s place on Walden Pond and his mother left his supper on the doorstep every night, may be. 😛 But I have one of his quotes on my bulletin board, too: “The cost of a thing is the amount of what I will call life which is required to be exchanged for it, immediately, or in the long run.” So he was consistent and mulling over acquisitions, apparently. > > But when considering an impulse buy it always makes me ask his paraphrased question To dust or not to dust? _That_ is the question. The “irony” here is that the repetition violates the concept of simplification. It’s sort of like “Eschew verbose obfuscation.” Nobody’s arguing that simplification wasn’t a major concept for Thoreau or that he didn’t make efforts to achieve such.