The greater truth, the greater libel.
Meaning: Truth's harshness wounds deeper when it exposes powerful lies or uncomfortable realities about important matters.
Origin: Recorded in A Dictionary of English Proverbs and Proverbial Phrases, an undated collection published in London by Whittaker & Co. around 1880 and credited to Thomas Preston. Its earlier history hasn't been traced.
More proverbs about Morality
- Every one as they like best, as the good man said when he kissed his cow. — Absurd personal preferences deserve no justification—everyone pursues their own oddities…
- A little good is soon spent. — Small acts of virtue quickly disappear without sustained effort or intention behind them.
- Losers are always in the wrong. — The defeated rewrite history to blame circumstances rather than acknowledge their own fai…
- Love is the touchstone of virtue. — Genuine moral character reveals itself through how deeply and selflessly we treat those w…
- If fools went not to market, bad ware would not be sold. — Foolish buyers create demand for inferior goods, enabling unscrupulous sellers to profit…
- Of all the crafts honesty is the master-craft. — Honesty forms the foundation enabling all other virtues and skills to function with genui…