"People don’t like to have somebody knowing more than they do. It aggravates them."

"I don't know, but they did it. They've done it before and they did it tonight and they'll do it again and when they do it--seems that only children weep."

"Before Jem looks at anyone else he looks at me, and I’ve tried to live so I can look squarely back at him."

"Scout, I m telling you for the last time, shut your trap or go home - I declare to the Lord you re gettin more like a girl every day!” With that, I had no option but to join them."

"Cry about the simple hell people give other people- without even thinking. Cry about the hell white people give colored folks, without even stopping to think that they're people too."

"There's just some kind of men you have to shoot before you can say hidy to 'em. Even then, they ain't worth the bullet it takes to shoot 'em."

"Remember this also: it’s always easy to look back and see what we were, yesterday, ten years ago. It is hard to see what we are. If you can master that trick, you’ll get along."

"The book to read is not the one that thinks for you but the one which makes you think."

"I shall never marry, Atticus." "Why?" "I might have children."

"As sure as time, history is repeating itself, and as sure as man is man, history is the last place he’ll look for his lessons."

"You can't really get to know a person until you get in their shoes and walk around in them."

"I wonder how much of the day I spend just callin' after you."

"Some negroes lie, some are immoral, some negro men are not be trusted around women - black and white. But this is a truth that applies to the human race and to no particular race of men."

"A man can condemn his enemies, but it’s wiser to know them."

"Atticus had said it was the polite thing to talk to people about what they were interested in, not about what you were interested in."

"He turned out the light and went into Jem's room. He would be there all night, and he would be there when Jem waked up in the morning."

"See there?" Jem was scowling triumphantly. "Nothin' to it. I swear, Scout, sometimes you act so much like a girl its mortifyin"

"[T]he time your friends need you is when they’re wrong, Jean Louise. They don’t need you when they’re right"

"Dill?" Mm?" Why do you reckon Boo Radleys never run off?" Dill sighed a long sigh and turned away from me. Maybe he doesn't have anywhere to run off to"

"You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view—” “Sir?” “—until you climb into his skin and walk around in it."

"I'm little but I'm old."

"I don't want to hear any words like that while I'm here. Scout, you'll get in trouble if you go around saying things like that. You want to grow up to be a lady, don't you?' I said not particularly."

"Every man’s island, Jean Louise, every man’s watchman, is his conscience. There is no such thing as a collective conscious."

"Try fighting with your head for a change... it's a good one, even if it does resist learning."