QuoteProject
How many legs does a dog have if you call the tail a leg? Four. Calling a tail a leg doesn't make it a leg.
Abraham Lincoln
ShareWTF𝕏

Interpretation

What this quote means

This quote illustrates the difference between perception and reality.

Abraham Lincoln's quote highlights that simply labeling something differently does not change its intrinsic nature. In this case, even if one were to call a tail a 'leg,' it does not change the fact that a dog has only four legs. It serves as a metaphor for understanding truth and reality beyond superficial declarations or societal labels.

Themes

TruthRealityPerceptionLabelsPhilosophy

In practice

Example use cases

In a discussion about how societal labels can mislead, this quote can emphasize the importance of recognizing truth.

More from Abraham Lincoln

I am like a man so busy in letting rooms in one end of his house, that he can't stop to put out the fire that is burning the other.
Abraham LincolnRead
Sir, my concern is not whether God is on our side; my greatest concern is to be on God's side, for God is always right.
Abraham LincolnRead
Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first four sharpening the axe.
Abraham LincolnRead
For it has been said, all that a man hath will he give for his life; and while all contribute of their substance the soldier puts his life at stake, and often yields it up in his country's cause. The highest merit, then is due to the soldier.
Abraham LincolnRead
And having thus chosen our course, without guile, and with pure purpose, let us renew our trust in God, and go forward without fear, and with manly hearts.
Abraham LincolnRead
The shepherd drives the wolf from the sheep's throat, for which the sheep thanks the shepherd as his liberator, while the wolf denounces him for the same act as the destroyer of liberty. Plainly, the sheep and the wolf are not agreed upon a definition of liberty.
Abraham LincolnRead

Similar quotes

The moon of Mahomet Arose, and it shall set; While, blazoned as on heaven's immortal noon, The cross leads generations on.
Percy Bysshe ShelleyRead
We want to bear witness today that we know the relation between corporate greed and what goes on too often in the Supreme Court decisions.
Cornel WestRead
Perhaps no promise in life is more reassuring than that promise of divine assistance and spiritual guidance in times of need. It is a gift freely given from heaven, a gift that we need from our earliest youth through the very latest days of our lives.
Howard W. HunterRead
Religions are founded by what mystics say when they come back; but what the mystics say is not the same as what happened to them.
Ram DassRead
In polite society, we call our obsessions hobbies.
Stephen KingRead
I have come to believe that the whole world is an enigma, a harmless enigma that is made terrible by our own mad attempt to interpret it as though it had an underlying truth. If two or three persons should come with a high spiritual aim and with great powers, the world would fall into their hands like a ripe peach.
Ralph Waldo EmersonRead

A little wisdom, now and then

Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.