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.

It is easy to be wise after the event.

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

It is an old maxim of mine that when you have excluded the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth. - The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, "The Beryl Coronet".

For strange effects and extraordinary combinations we must go to life itself, which is always far more daring than any effort of the imagination.

As a rule, said Holmes, the more bizarre a thing is the less mysterious it proves to be. It is your commonplace, featureless crimes which are really puzzling, just as a commonplace face is the most difficult to identify.