--- title: "9 Samuel Butler Quotes by 9 authors" description: "Browse 9 Samuel Butler quotes by 9 authors. Discover the best Samuel Butler sayings and thoughts." image: "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/0f2/samuel-butler-823_art_life-is-the-art-of-drawing-sufficient-co_1505928.jpg" --- > [Life is the art of drawing sufficient conclusions from insufficient premises. Samuel Butler](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/samuel-butler/life-is-the-art-of-drawing-sufficient-conclusions-from-insufficient-2/) [Samuel Butler](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/samuel-butler/) [Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/0f2/samuel-butler-823_art_life-is-the-art-of-drawing-sufficient-co_1505928.jpg) > [Why does Samuel Butler say, 'Wise men never say what they think of women'? Wise men never say anything else apparently.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/virginia-woolf/why-does-samuel-butler-say-wise-men-never-say-what-they-think-of/) [Virginia Woolf](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/virginia-woolf/) [Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/a44/virginia-woolf-49_butler_why-does-samuel-butler-say-wise-men-neve_16303.jpg) > [“Life, said Samuel Butler, is like giving a concert on the violin while learning to play the instrument—that, friends, is real wisdom.”](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/saul-bellow/life-said-samuel-butler-is-like-giving-a-concert-on-the-violin-while/) [Saul Bellow](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/saul-bellow/) [Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/669/saul-bellow-558_butler_life-said-samuel-butler-is-like-giving-a_1021478.png) > [Tobacco . . . is not prohibited in the Scriptures, though, as Samuel Butler points out, St. Paul would no doubt have…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bertrand-russell/tobacco-is-not-prohibited-in-the-scriptures-though-as-samuel-butler/) [Bertrand Russell](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bertrand-russell/) [Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/94f/bertrand-russell-69_butlers_tobacco-is-not-prohibited-in-the-scriptu_1856915.jpg) > [ “He \[Samuel Butler\] made a practise of doing the forks last when washing up, on the grounds that he might die before… ](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/philip-larkin/he-samuel-butler-made-a-practise-of-doing-the-forks-last-when-washing/) [Philip Larkin](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/philip-larkin/) [Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/de2/philip-larkin-1822_samuel-butler_he-samuel-butler-made-a-practise-of-doin_2787889.jpg) > [In the end I came to see that the true prophet of the modern world was Samuel Butler: when he suggested that…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/robert-aickman/in-the-end-i-came-to-see-that-the-true-prophet-of-the-modern-world/) [Robert Aickman](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/robert-aickman/) [Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/26e/robert-aickman-25472_butlers_in-the-end-i-came-to-see-that-the-true-p_243993.jpg) > [“I want to be able to do anything with words: handle slashing, flaming descriptions like Wells, and use the paradox with the…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/f-scott-fitzgerald/i-want-to-be-able-to-do-anything-with-words-handle-slashing-flaming/) [F. Scott Fitzgerald](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/f-scott-fitzgerald/) [Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/e6b/f-scott-fitzgerald-72_language_i-want-to-be-able-to-do-anything-with-wo_1029891.jpg) > [“Food of Love Eating is touch carried to the bitter end. -Samuel Butler II I'm going to murder you with love; I'm…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/carolyn-kizer/food-of-love-eating-is-touch-carried-to-the-bitter-end-samuel-butler/) [Carolyn Kizer](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/carolyn-kizer/) [Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/4c7/carolyn-kizer-31047_eating_food-of-love-eating-is-touch-carried-to_1457545.png) > [“Fireflies out on a warm summer's night, seeing the urgent, flashing, yellow-white phosphorescence below them, go crazy with desire; moths cast to…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/carl-sagan/fireflies-out-on-a-warm-summer-s-night-seeing-the-urgent-flashing/) [Carl Sagan](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/carl-sagan/) [Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/c60/carl-sagan-160_animals_fireflies-out-on-a-warm-summer-s-night-s_2007292.jpg) ```json { "@context": "https://schema.org", "@graph": [ { "@type": "ItemList", "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/samuel-butler/#itemlist", "name": "Samuel Butler Quotes", "numberOfItems": 9, "itemListElement": [ { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 1, "item": { "@type": "Quotation", "text": "Life is the art of drawing sufficient conclusions from insufficient premises. Samuel Butler", "creator": { "@type": "Person", "name": "Samuel Butler" }, "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/samuel-butler/life-is-the-art-of-drawing-sufficient-conclusions-from-insufficient-2/", "image": { "@type": "ImageObject", "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/0f2/samuel-butler-823_art_life-is-the-art-of-drawing-sufficient-co_1505928.jpg", "contentUrl": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/0f2/samuel-butler-823_art_life-is-the-art-of-drawing-sufficient-co_1505928.jpg", "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/0f2/samuel-butler-823_art_life-is-the-art-of-drawing-sufficient-co_1505928.jpg", "width": 1080, "height": 1080, "caption": "“Life is the art of drawing sufficient conclusions from insufficient premises. Samuel Butler” — Samuel Butler", "creditText": "SMS4Smile Quotes", "creator": { "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/#organization" } } } }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 2, "item": { "@type": "Quotation", "text": "Why does Samuel Butler say, 'Wise men never say what they think of women'? Wise men never say anything else apparently.", "creator": { "@type": "Person", "name": "Virginia Woolf" }, "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/virginia-woolf/why-does-samuel-butler-say-wise-men-never-say-what-they-think-of/", "image": { "@type": "ImageObject", "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/a44/virginia-woolf-49_butler_why-does-samuel-butler-say-wise-men-neve_16303.jpg", "contentUrl": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/a44/virginia-woolf-49_butler_why-does-samuel-butler-say-wise-men-neve_16303.jpg", "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/a44/virginia-woolf-49_butler_why-does-samuel-butler-say-wise-men-neve_16303.jpg", "width": 1080, "height": 1080, "caption": "“Why does Samuel Butler say, 'Wise men never say what they think of women'? Wise men never say anything else…” — Virginia Woolf", "creditText": "SMS4Smile Quotes", "creator": { "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/#organization" } } } }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 3, "item": { "@type": "Quotation", "text": "“Life, said Samuel Butler, is like giving a concert on the violin while learning to play the instrument—that, friends, is real wisdom.”", "creator": { "@type": "Person", "name": "Saul Bellow" }, "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/saul-bellow/life-said-samuel-butler-is-like-giving-a-concert-on-the-violin-while/", "image": { "@type": "ImageObject", "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/669/saul-bellow-558_butler_life-said-samuel-butler-is-like-giving-a_1021478.png", "contentUrl": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/669/saul-bellow-558_butler_life-said-samuel-butler-is-like-giving-a_1021478.png", "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/669/saul-bellow-558_butler_life-said-samuel-butler-is-like-giving-a_1021478.png", "width": 1080, "height": 1080, "caption": "“Life, said Samuel Butler, is like giving a concert on the violin while learning to play the instrument—that…” — Saul Bellow", "creditText": "SMS4Smile Quotes", "creator": { "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/#organization" } } } }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 4, "item": { "@type": "Quotation", "text": "Tobacco . . . is not prohibited in the Scriptures, though, as Samuel Butler points out, St. Paul would no doubt have denounced it if he had known of it.", "creator": { "@type": "Person", "name": "Bertrand Russell" }, "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bertrand-russell/tobacco-is-not-prohibited-in-the-scriptures-though-as-samuel-butler/", "image": { "@type": "ImageObject", "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/94f/bertrand-russell-69_butlers_tobacco-is-not-prohibited-in-the-scriptu_1856915.jpg", "contentUrl": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/94f/bertrand-russell-69_butlers_tobacco-is-not-prohibited-in-the-scriptu_1856915.jpg", "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/94f/bertrand-russell-69_butlers_tobacco-is-not-prohibited-in-the-scriptu_1856915.jpg", "width": 1080, "height": 1080, "caption": "“Tobacco . . . is not prohibited in the Scriptures, though, as Samuel Butler points out, St. Paul would no…” — Bertrand Russell", "creditText": "SMS4Smile Quotes", "creator": { "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/#organization" } } } }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 5, "item": { "@type": "Quotation", "text": "“He [Samuel Butler] made a practise of doing the forks last when washing up, on the grounds that he might die before he got to them. This is very much his principle of 'eating the grapes downwards', so that however many grapes you have eaten the next is always the best of the remainder.”", "creator": { "@type": "Person", "name": "Philip Larkin" }, "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/philip-larkin/he-samuel-butler-made-a-practise-of-doing-the-forks-last-when-washing/", "image": { "@type": "ImageObject", "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/de2/philip-larkin-1822_samuel-butler_he-samuel-butler-made-a-practise-of-doin_2787889.jpg", "contentUrl": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/de2/philip-larkin-1822_samuel-butler_he-samuel-butler-made-a-practise-of-doin_2787889.jpg", "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/de2/philip-larkin-1822_samuel-butler_he-samuel-butler-made-a-practise-of-doin_2787889.jpg", "width": 1080, "height": 1080, "caption": "“He [Samuel Butler] made a practise of doing the forks last when washing up, on the grounds that he might die…” — Philip Larkin", "creditText": "SMS4Smile Quotes", "creator": { "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/#organization" } } } }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 6, "item": { "@type": "Quotation", "text": "In the end I came to see that the true prophet of the modern world was Samuel Butler: when he suggested that the machine was an evolutionary development, destined to supersede man as the dominant species and reduce him to greenfly status, the status of machine-minder, homo mechanicus instead of homo sapiens; and to modify his nature accordingly.", "creator": { "@type": "Person", "name": "Robert Aickman" }, "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/robert-aickman/in-the-end-i-came-to-see-that-the-true-prophet-of-the-modern-world/", "image": { "@type": "ImageObject", "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/26e/robert-aickman-25472_butlers_in-the-end-i-came-to-see-that-the-true-p_243993.jpg", "contentUrl": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/26e/robert-aickman-25472_butlers_in-the-end-i-came-to-see-that-the-true-p_243993.jpg", "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/26e/robert-aickman-25472_butlers_in-the-end-i-came-to-see-that-the-true-p_243993.jpg", "width": 1080, "height": 1080, "caption": "“In the end I came to see that the true prophet of the modern world was Samuel Butler: when he suggested that…” — Robert Aickman", "creditText": "SMS4Smile Quotes", "creator": { "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/#organization" } } } }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 7, "item": { "@type": "Quotation", "text": "“I want to be able to do anything with words: handle slashing, flaming descriptions like Wells, and use the paradox with the clarity of Samuel Butler, the breadth of Bernard Shaw and the wit of Oscar Wilde, I want to do the wide sultry heavens of Conrad, the rolled-gold sundowns and crazy-quilt skies of Hitchens and Kipling as well as the pastel dawns and twilights of Chesterton. All that is by way of example. As a matter of fact I am a professed literary thief, hot after the best methods of every writer in my generation.”", "creator": { "@type": "Person", "name": "F. Scott Fitzgerald" }, "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/f-scott-fitzgerald/i-want-to-be-able-to-do-anything-with-words-handle-slashing-flaming/", "image": { "@type": "ImageObject", "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/e6b/f-scott-fitzgerald-72_language_i-want-to-be-able-to-do-anything-with-wo_1029891.jpg", "contentUrl": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/e6b/f-scott-fitzgerald-72_language_i-want-to-be-able-to-do-anything-with-wo_1029891.jpg", "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/e6b/f-scott-fitzgerald-72_language_i-want-to-be-able-to-do-anything-with-wo_1029891.jpg", "width": 1080, "height": 1080, "caption": "“I want to be able to do anything with words: handle slashing, flaming descriptions like Wells, and use the…” — F. Scott Fitzgerald", "creditText": "SMS4Smile Quotes", "creator": { "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/#organization" } } } }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 8, "item": { "@type": "Quotation", "text": "“Food of Love Eating is touch carried to the bitter end. -Samuel Butler II I'm going to murder you with love; I'm going to suffocate you with embraces; I'm going to hug you, bone by bone, Till you're dead all over. Then I will dine on your delectable marrow. You will become my personal Sahara; I'll sun myself in you, then with one swallow Drain you remaining brackish well. With my female blade I'll carve my name In your most aspiring palm Before I chop it down. Then I'll inhale your last oasis whole. But in the total desert you become You'll see me stretch, horizon to horizon, Opulent mirage! Wisteria balconies dripping cyclamen. Vistas ablaze with crystal, laced in gold. So you will summon each dry grain of sand And move towards me in undulating dunes Till you arrive at sudden ultramarine: A Mediterranean to stroke your dusty shores; Obstinate verdue, creeping inland, fast renudes Your barrens; succulents spring up everywhere, Surprising life! And I will be that green. When you are fed and watered, flourishing With shoots entwining trellis, dome and spire, Till you are resurrected field in bloom, I will devour you, my natural food, My host, my final supper on the earth, And you'll begin to die again. ”", "creator": { "@type": "Person", "name": "Carolyn Kizer" }, "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/carolyn-kizer/food-of-love-eating-is-touch-carried-to-the-bitter-end-samuel-butler/", "image": { "@type": "ImageObject", "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/4c7/carolyn-kizer-31047_eating_food-of-love-eating-is-touch-carried-to_1457545.png", "contentUrl": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/4c7/carolyn-kizer-31047_eating_food-of-love-eating-is-touch-carried-to_1457545.png", "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/4c7/carolyn-kizer-31047_eating_food-of-love-eating-is-touch-carried-to_1457545.png", "width": 1080, "height": 1080, "caption": "“Food of Love Eating is touch carried to the bitter end. -Samuel Butler II I'm going to murder you with love…” — Carolyn Kizer", "creditText": "SMS4Smile Quotes", "creator": { "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/#organization" } } } }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 9, "item": { "@type": "Quotation", "text": "“Fireflies out on a warm summer's night, seeing the urgent, flashing, yellow-white phosphorescence below them, go crazy with desire; moths cast to the winds an enchantment potion that draws the opposite sex, wings beating hurriedly, from kilometers away; peacocks display a devastating corona of blue and green and the peahens are all aflutter; competing pollen grains extrude tiny tubes that race each other down the female flower's orifice to the waiting egg below; luminescent squid present rhapsodic light shows, altering the pattern, brightness and color radiated from their heads, tentacles, and eyeballs; a tapeworm diligently lays a hundred thousand fertilized eggs in a single day; a great whale rumbles through the ocean depths uttering plaintive cries that are understood hundreds of thousands of kilometers away, where another lonely behemoth is attentively listening; bacteria sidle up to one another and merge; cicadas chorus in a collective serenade of love; honeybee couples soar on matrimonial flights from which only one partner returns; male fish spray their spunk over a slimy clutch of eggs laid by God-knows-who; dogs, out cruising, sniff each other's nether parts, seeking erotic stimuli; flowers exude sultry perfumes and decorate their petals with garish ultraviolet advertisements for passing insects, birds, and bats; and men and women sing, dance, dress, adorn, paint, posture, self-mutilate, demand, coerce, dissemble, plead, succumb, and risk their lives. To say that love makes the world go around is to go too far. The Earth spins because it did so as it was formed and there has been nothing to stop it since. But the nearly maniacal devotion to sex and love by most of the plants, animals, and microbes with which we are familiar is a pervasive and striking aspect of life on Earth. It cries out for explanation. What is all this in aid of? What is the torrent of passion and obsession about? Why will organisms go without sleep, without food, gladly put themselves in mortal danger for sex? ... For more than half the history of life on Earth organisms seem to have done perfectly well without it. What good is sex?... Through 4 billion years of natural selection, instructions have been honed and fine-tuned...sequences of As, Cs, Gs, and Ts, manuals written out in the alphabet of life in competition with other similar manuals published by other firms. The organisms become the means through which the instructions flow and copy themselves, by which new instructions are tried out, on which selection operates. 'The hen,' said Samuel Butler, 'is the egg's way of making another egg.' It is on this level that we must understand what sex is for. ... The sockeye salmon exhaust themselves swimming up the mighty Columbia River to spawn, heroically hurdling cataracts, in a single-minded effort that works to propagate their DNA sequences into future generation. The moment their work is done, they fall to pieces. Scales flake off, fins drop, and soon--often within hours of spawning--they are dead and becoming distinctly aromatic. They've served their purpose. Nature is unsentimental. Death is built in.”", "creator": { "@type": "Person", "name": "Carl Sagan" }, "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/carl-sagan/fireflies-out-on-a-warm-summer-s-night-seeing-the-urgent-flashing/", "image": { "@type": "ImageObject", "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/c60/carl-sagan-160_animals_fireflies-out-on-a-warm-summer-s-night-s_2007292.jpg", "contentUrl": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/c60/carl-sagan-160_animals_fireflies-out-on-a-warm-summer-s-night-s_2007292.jpg", "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/c60/carl-sagan-160_animals_fireflies-out-on-a-warm-summer-s-night-s_2007292.jpg", "width": 1080, "height": 1080, "caption": "“Fireflies out on a warm summer's night, seeing the urgent, flashing, yellow-white phosphorescence below…” — Carl Sagan", "creditText": "SMS4Smile Quotes", "creator": { "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/#organization" } } } } ] }, { "@type": "CollectionPage", "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/samuel-butler/#webpage", "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/samuel-butler/", "name": "Samuel Butler Quotes", "isPartOf": { "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/#website" }, "mainEntity": { "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/samuel-butler/#itemlist" }, "primaryImageOfPage": { "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/0f2/samuel-butler-823_art_life-is-the-art-of-drawing-sufficient-co_1505928.jpg" }, "description": "Browse 9 Samuel Butler quotes by 9 authors. 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