Trifles Quotes

“You know my method. It is founded upon the observation of trifles.”
― Arthur Conan Doyle, The Boscombe Valley Mystery - a Sherlock Holmes Short Story

“In all my experience along the dirtiest ways of this dirty little world, I have never met with such a thing as a trifle yet.”
― Wilkie Collins, The Moonstone

“The affair seems absurdly trifling, and yet I dare call nothing trivial when I reflect that some of my most classic cases have had the least promising commencement. You will remember, Watson, how the dreadful business of the Abernetty family was first brought to my notice by the depth which the parsley had sunk into the butter upon a hot day.”
― Arthur Conan Doyle, The Adventure of the Six Napoleons / The Adventure of the Crooked Man

“A trifle consoles us because a trifle upsets us.”
― Blaise Pascal, Pensées

“Asks, he does…
But Oh!
A question so small…”
― Vijay Fafat, The Ninth Pawn of White - A Book of Unwritten Verses

“Out of what trifles grow the tragedies of life.”
― Charles W. Chesnutt, Conjure Tales and Stories of the Color Line

“I barely understand people who spend years pondering unimportant things. They dedicate their time to fretting about superficialities, but the fact that death will soon rob them of everything, that they disregard. I am sad when I see the human heart which can be oversensitive to certain trifles, but at the same time be completely oblivious to its very own existence.”
― Tomáš Gavlas, Karlaz: The Way of Freedom

“The most trifling matters may sometimes be not only the commencement, but the causes, of the gravest discussions. The fall of an apple from a tree suggested the doctrine of gravitation; and the same apple, for aught we know, served up in a dumpling, may have assisted the philosopher in his notions of heat ; for who has not witnessed similar causes and effects at a dinner table ? I confess, a piece of mutton has supplied me with arguments, as well as chops, for a week ; I have seen a hare or a cod’s-head giving hints to a friend for his next Essay; and have known the most solemn reflections rise, with a pair of claws, out of a pigeon-pie.”
― Leigh Hunt, The Round Table: A Collection of Essays on Literature, Men and Manners

“Trifles in the aggregate become great social forces.”
― Beth Brower, The Unselected Journals of Emma M. Lion: Vol. 6

“To estimate a man’s condition in regard to happiness, it is necessary to ask, not what things please him, but what things trouble him; and the more trivial these things are in themselves, the happier the man will be. To be irritated by trifles, a man must be well off; for in misfortunes trifles are unfelt.”
― Arthur Schopenhauer, Counsels and Maxims