“It’s every man’s business to see justice done.”

“A hound it was, an enormous coal-black hound, but not such a hound as mortal eyes have ever seen.”

“You know,' I answered, with some emotion, for I had never seen so much of Holmes' heart before, 'that it is my greatest joy and privilege to help you.”

“If you want to write good copy, you must be where the things are.”

“It may have been a comedy, or it may have been a tragedy. It cost one man his reason, it cost me a blood-letting, and it cost yet another man the penalties of the law. Yet there was certainly an element of comedy. Well, you shall judge for yourselves.”

“And that was how a great scandal threatened to affect the kingdom of Bohemia, and how the best plans of Mr. Sherlock Holmes were beaten by a woman’s wit. He used to make merry over the cleverness of women, but I have not heard him do it of late. And when he speaks of Irene Adler, or when he refers to her photograph, it is always under the honourable title of the woman.”

“Her cuisine is limited but she has as good an idea of breakfast as a Scotchwoman."

“A strong wind sang sadly as it bent the trees in front of the Hall. A half moon shone through the dark, flying clouds on to the wild and empty moor.”

“She was as good as she was beautiful and as intelligent as she was good.”

“Draw your chair up, and hand me my violin, for the only problem which we have still to solve is how to while away these bleak autumnal evenings.”

“If my future were black, it was better surely to face it like a man than to attempt to brighten it by mere will-o’-the-wisps of the imagination.”

“When people bury treasure nowadays they do it in the Post-Office bank.”

“It is a pity he did not write in pencil. As you have no doubt frequently observed, the impression usually goes through -- a fact which has dissolved many a happy marriage.”

“There are women in whom the love of a lover extinguishes all other loves, and I think that she must have been one.”

“I should prefer that you do not mention my name at all in connection with this case, as I choose to be only associated with those crimes which present some difficulty in their solution.”

“I confess that I have been as blind as a mole, but is is better to learn wisdom late than never to learn it at all.”

“Brain, character, soul—only as one sees more of life does one understand how distinct is each.”

“I never make exceptions. An exception disproves the rule.”

“The world is big enough for us. No ghosts need apply.”

“You will, I am sure, agree with me that... if page 534 only finds us in the second chapter, the length of the first one must have been really intolerable.”

“Read it up – you really should. There is nothing new under the sun. It has all been done before.”

“I love and am loved by a better man than he.”

“It's stupidity rather than courage to refuse to recognize danger when it is close upon you.”

“You did, Doctor, but none the less you must come round to my view, for otherwise I shall keep on piling fact upon fact on you until your reason breaks down under them and acknowledges me to be right.”

“I fear that if the matter is beyond humanity, it is certainly beyond me.”

“There are no fools so troublesome as those of the mind”

“Yes, there are in me the makings of a very fine loafer, and also of a pretty spry sort of fellow. I often think of those lines of old Goethe: 'Schade, daß die Natur nur einen Menschen aus dir schuf; Denn zum würdigen Mann war und zum Schelmen der Stoff.'”

“My mind rebels at stagnation. Give me problems, give me work, give me the most abstruse cryptogram, or the most intricate analysis, and I am in my own proper atmosphere. I can dispense with artificial stimulants. But I abhor the dull routine of existence. I crave for mental exaltation. That is why I have chosen my own particular profession, or rather created it, for I am the only one in the world.”

“It is the German who is so uncourteous to his verbs”

“I have heard, Mr. Holmes, that you can see deeply into the manifold wickedness of the human heart.”

“I shall never do that,' I answered; 'you have brought detection as near an exact science as it ever will be brought in this world.”

“I have no data yet. It is a capital mistake to theorise before one has data. Insensibly one begins to twist facts to suit theories, instead of theories to suit facts.”

“There are strange red depths in the soul of the most commonplace man.”

“I had no friends who would call upon me and break the monotony of my daily existence.”

“My sympathies and my love went out to her, even as my hand had in the garden. I felt that years of the conventionalities of life could not teach me to know her sweet, brave nature as had this one day of strange experiences. Yet there were two thoughts which sealed the words of affection upon my lips. She was weak and helpless, shaken in mind and nerve. It was to take her at a disadvantage to obtrude love upon her at such a time. Worst still, she was rich.”

“My correspondence has certainly the charm of variety, and the humbler are usually the more interesting. This looks like one of those unwelcome social summonses which call upon a man either to be bored or to lie.”

“There's many a man who never tells his adventures, for he can't hope to be believed.”

“My line of thoughts about dogs is analogous. A dog reflects the family life. Whoever saw a frisky dog in a gloomy family, or a sad dog in a happy one? Snarling people have snarling dogs, dangerous people have dangerous ones. And their passing moods may reflect the passing moods of others.”

“[O]n general principles it is best that I should not leave the country. Scotland Yard feels lonely without me, and it causes an unhealthy excitement among the criminal classes.”

“To a great mind, nothing is little.”

“It is that the chief proof of man's real greatness lies in his perception of his own smallness.”

“What object is served by this circle of misery and violence and fear? It must tend to some end, or else our universe is ruled by chance, which is unthinkable. But what end? There is the great standing perennial problem to which human reason is as far from an answer as ever.”

“He made the country down in Illinois, and He made the Missouri", the little girl continued. "I guess somebody else made the country in these parts. It's not nearly so well done. They forgot the water and the trees.”

“It is only when you touch the higher that you realize how low we may be among the possibilities of creation.”

“The ideal reasoner would, when he had once been shown a single fact in all its bearings, deduce from it not only all the chain of events which led up to it but also the results which would follow from it.”

“It is all in the way of professional experience.

“It is, of course, a trifle, but there is nothing so important as trifles.”

“It is a question of cubic capacity," said he; "a man with so large a brain must have something in it.”

“I am afraid, my dear Watson, that most of your conclusions were erroneous. When I said that you stimulated me I meant, to be frank, that in noting your fallacies I was occasionally guided towards the truth. Not that you are entirely wrong in this instance”

“From my boyhood I have had an intense and overwhelming conviction that my real vocation lay in the direction of literature. I have, however, had a most unaccountable difficulty in getting any responsible person to share my views.