Agatha Christie

“In every profession and walk of life there is someone who is vulnerablle to temptation. (Mr. Barnes)”

“People who can be very good can be very bad too.”

“Every woman should make one mistake matrimonially. - Alex Restarick”

“People will quite often do anything for money. - Jane Marple”

“You might start a new religion yourself, with the creed: 'There is no one so clever as Hercule Poirot, Amen, D. C. Repeat ad lib.'!”

“It will prove, I fear, too Herculean a task for us.”

“My dear Mr. Schwartz, you appeared in the nick of time. It might have been a drama on the stage! I am very much in your debt.”

“Mon cher docteur! Do you not think I know the female mentality? The village gossip, it is based always, always on the relations of the sexes. If a man poisons his wife in order to travel to the North Pole or to enjoy the peace of a bachelor existence—it would not interest his fellow-villagers for a minute!”

“It's really very unpleasant. And not being able to say anything to answer back makes it rankle more, if you know what I mean.”

“Take this Hercules -this hero! Hero, indeed! What was he but a large muscular creature of low intelligence and criminal tendencies!”

“Got on! Got on! It's not a question of getting on. That's the wrong view altogether. The Classics aren't a ladder leading to quick success.”

“Heart failure, it explains nothing! I have yet to meet a corpse whose heart it still beats.”

“It often seems to me that's all detective work is, wiping out your false starts and beginning again.""Yes, it is very true, that. And it is just what some people will not do. They conceive a certain theory, and everything has to fit into that theory. If one little fact will not fit it, they throw it aside. But it is always the facts that will not fit in that are significant.”

“Words, madmoiselle, are only the outer clothing of ideas.”

“One never quite allows for the moron in our midst.”

“I suppose it is because nearly all children go to school nowadays and have things arranged for them that they seem so forlornly unable to produce their own ideas.”

“Time is the best killer.”

“The truth, however ugly in itself, is always curious and beautiful to seekers after it.”

“Profesi suami yang paling baik bagi wanita adalah arkeolog. Karena semakin tua si wanita, suami akan semakin tertarik kepadanya.”

“One of the luckiest things that can happen to you in life is to have a happy childhood.”

“One of the oddest things in life, as we all know, is the way that when you have heard a thing mentioned, within twenty-four hours you nearly always come across it again.”

“I've heard that you're the cat's whiskers, M. Poirot.""Comment? The cat's whiskers? I do not understand.""Well that you're It.""Madame, I may or may not have brains - as a matter of fact I have - why pretend?”

“He belonged to that inarticulate order of young Englishmen who dislike any form of emotion, and who find it peculiarly hard to explain their mental processes in words.”

“The dog hunts rabbits. Hercule Poirot hunts murderers.”

“He dragged me back - just in time. A tree had crashed down on to the side walk, just missing us. Poirot stared at it, pale and upset. "It was a near thing that! But clumsy, all the same - for I had no suspicion - at least hardly any suspicion. Yes, but for my quick eyes, the eyes of a cat, Hercule Poirot might now be crushed out of existence - a terrible calamity for the world. And you, too, mon ami - though that would not be such a national catastrophe." "Thank you," I said coldly.”

“Pas encore. Qa m'amuse.""Really, Poirot!""Yes, my friend. I grow old and childish, do I not?”

“Elephants can remember, but we are human beings and mercifully human beings can forget.”

“Of course. I understand.""One of your brilliant mentality could not fail to do so, Hastings.”

“If only-if only, Hastings, you would part your hair in the middle instead of at the side! What a difference it would make to the symmetry of your appearance. And your moustache. If you must have a moustache, let it be a real moustache-a thing of beauty such as mine.”

“There! Now we're friends!" declared the minx. "Say you're sorry about my sister -""I am desolated!""That's a good boy!”

“Tommy, why did they put Maldon Surrey on the telegram?""Because Maldon is in Surrey, idiot.”

“That is what I mean. A bath! The receptacle of porcelain, one turns the taps and fills it, one gets in, one gets out and ghoosh - ghoosh - ghoosh, the water goes down the waste pipe!""M. Poirot are you quite mad?""No, I am extremely sane.”

“What good is money if it can't buy happiness?”

“Sometimes, as a great treat, I was allowed to remove Nursie's snowy ruffled cap. Without it, she somehow retreated into private life and lost her official status. Then, with elaborate care, I would tie a large blue satin ribbon round her head - with enormous difficulty and holding my breath, because tying a bow is no easy matter for a four-year-old. After which I would step back and exclaim in ecstasy: "Oh Nursie, you ARE beautiful!" At which she would smile and say in her gentle voice: "Am I, love?”

“You've a pretty good nerve," said Ratchett. "Will twenty thousand dollars tempt you?"It will not."If you're holding out for more, you won't get it. I know what a thing's worth to me."I, also M. Ratchett."What's wrong with my proposition?"Poirot rose. "If you will forgive me for being personal - I do not like your face, M. Ratchett," he said.”

“At the small table, sitting very upright, was one of the ugliest old ladies he had ever seen. It was an ugliness of distinction - it fascinated rather than repelled.”

“You are the patient one, Mademoiselle,' said Poirot to Miss Debenham.She shrugged her shoulders slightly. 'What else can one do?'You are a philosopher, Mademoiselle.'That implies a detached attitude. I think my attitude is more selfish. I have learned to save myself useless emotion.”

“I am not one to rely upon the expert procedure. It is the psychology I seek, not the fingerprint or the cigarette ash.”

“As you yourself have said, what other explanation can there be?'Poirot stared straight ahead of him. 'That is what I ask myself,' he said. 'That is what I never cease to ask myself.”

“But I know human nature, my friend, and I tell you that, suddenly confronted with the possibility of being tried for murder, the most innocent person will lose his head and do the most absurd things.”

“I believe, Messieurs, in loyalty---to one's friends and one's family and one's caste.”

“It's like all those quiet people, when they do lose their tempers they lose them with a vengeance.”

“Sometimes I feel sure he is as mad as a hatter and then, just as he is at his maddest, I find there is a method in his madness.”

“Hasting - There are times when it is one's duty to assert oneself.”

“Mrs. Cavendish: I am charming to my friends one day, and forget all about them the next.”

“My dear Poirot, it's not for me to dictate to you. You have a right to your own opinion, just as I have mine.”

“Miss Howard: Like a good detective story myself. Lots of nonsense written, though. Criminal discovered in last Chapter. Everyone dumbfounded. Real crime - you'd know at once.”

“Liking is more important than loving. It lasts. I want what is between us to last, Luke. I don't want us just to love each other and marry and get tired of each other and then want to marry some one else.""Oh! my dear Love, I know. You want reality. So do I. What's between us will last for ever because it's founded on reality.”

“There is no telling what a human character is. Until the test comes. To most of us the test comes early in life. A man is confronted quite soon with the necessity to stand on his own feet, to face dangers and difficulties and to take his own line of dealing with them. It may be the straight way, it may be the crooked way --- whichever it is, a man usually learns early just what he is made of.”

“Sitting here with one's knitting, one just sees the facts. -"The Blood-Stained Pavement”