CAT QUOTES

Douglas Adams:
One of the problems of taking things apart and seeing how they work - supposing you're trying to find out how a cat works--you take that cat apart to see how it works, what you've got in your hands is a non-working cat. The cat wasn't a sort of clunky mechanism that was susceptible to our available tools of analysis.

Don Addis:
Never play cat and mouse games if you're a mouse.

Bill Adler:
A cat is there when you call her - if she doesn't have anything better to do.

Lloyd Alexander:
Two cats can live as cheaply as one, and their owner has twice as much fun.

Roseanne Ambrose-Brown
Places to look: behind the books in the bookshelf, any cupboard with a gap too small for any cat to squeeze through, the top of anything sheer, under anything too low for a cat to squash under and inside the piano.

Cleveland Amory:
Cats talk with their tails.

As anyone who has ever been around a cat for any length of time well knows, cats have enormous patience with the limitations of the human kind.

...one of the ways in which cats show happiness is by sleeping.

Roseanne Anderson:
In the middle of a world that has always been a bit mad, the cat walks with confidence.

Paul Annixter:
Passion for place - there is no greater urge in feline nature.

Michelle Argabrite:
I think my favorite thing in the house has to be the cat...mainly because she's just like a big piece of noisy Velcro when you toss her at the sofa.

Matthew Arnold:
Cruel, but composed and bland,
Dumb, inscrutable and grand,
So Tiberius might have sat,
Had Tiberius been a cat.

Alan Ayckbourn:
Cat names are more for human benefit. They give one a certain degree more confidence that the animal belongs to you.

Peggy Bacon:
I cannot exist without a cat...Life would not be worth living without a cat.

Stephen Baker:
Cats' hearing apparatus is built to allow the human voice to easily go in one ear and out the other.

Kittens are born with their eyes shut. They open them in about six days, take a look around, then close them again for the better part of their lives.

Most beds sleep up to six cats. Ten cats without the owner.

As a housepet, I'm overqualified.
- Speaking as a cat in How to Live with a Neurotic Cat

To bathe a cat takes brute force, perseverance, courage of conviction ? and a cat. The last ingredient is usually hardest to come by.

Oswald Barron:
She knows that nine lives are enough.

Drew Barrymore:
If I die before my cat, I want a little of my ashes put in his food so I can live inside him.

Wesley Bates:
There's no need for a piece of sculpture in a home that has a cat.

Charles Baudelaire:
Both ardent lovers and austere scholars, when once they come to the years of discretion, love cats, so strong and gentle, the pride of the household, who like them are sensitive to the cold, and sedentary.

Eric Temple Bell:
Cats hate water only when it is dumped on them, as who wouldn't? Given the opportunity, they will fish diligently in the neighborhood fish ponds.

Hilaire Belloc:
You are my cat and I am your human.

Margaret Benson:
A plate is distasteful to a cat, a newspaper still worse; they like to eat sticky pieces of meat sitting on a cushioned chair or a nice Persian rug.

A cat must either have beauty and breeding, or it must have a profession.

Ellen Perry Berkeley:
As every cat owner knows, nobody owns a cat.

Rev. W. Bingley:
Cats, by means of their whiskers, seem to possess something like an additional sense: these have, perhaps, some analogy to the antennae of moths and butterflies.

Roy Blount, Jr.:
If a cat spoke, it would say things like "Hey, I don't see the problem here."

Cats have intercepted my footsteps at the ankle for so long that my gait, both at home and on tour, has been compared to that of a man wading through low surf.

Mary Bly:
Dogs come when they're called. Cats take a message and get back to you later.

R. H. Blyth:
I myself think to have a cat is more important than to have a Bible.

Elayne Boosler:
A man who was loved by 300 women singled me out to live with him. Why? I was the only one without a cat.

Charles J. Brady:
The real measure of a day's heat is the length of a sleeping cat.

Arthur Bridges:
A cat isn't fussy - just so long as you remember he likes his milk in the shallow, rose-patterned saucer and his fish on the blue plate. From which he will take it, and eat it off the floor.

Philip Brown:
It was difficult to feel vexed by a creature that burst into a chorus of purring as soon as I spoke to him.

Dereke Bruce:
In order to keep a true perspective of one's importance, everyone should have a dog that will worship him and a cat that will ignore him.

Jean Burden:
Prowling his own quiet backyard or asleep by the fire, he is still only a whisker away from the wilds.

A dog, I have always said, is prose; a cat is a poem.

H. Monger Burdock:
A cat sleeping on your bed is a far more pleasant companion than a ninety-pound Labrador with bad breath. Furthermore, cats do not snore or break wind.

Edward Burlingame:
I love cats. I even think we have one at home.

Maurice Burton:
Anyone who claims that a cat cannot give a dirty look either has never kept a cat or is singularly unobservant.

Martin Buxbaum:
If we treated everyone we meet with the same affection we bestow upon our favorite cat, they, too, would purr.

Robert Byrne:
To err is human, to purr feline.

Dr. Louis J. Camuti:
Most cats, when they are Out want to be In, and vice versa, and often simultaneously.

There is something about the presence of a cat...that seems to take the bite out of being alone.

In my experience, cats and beds seem to be a natural combination.

Cat people are different, to the extent that they generally are not conformists. How could they be, with a cat running their lives?

Work - other people's work - is an intolerable idea to a cat. Can you picture cats herding sheep or agreeing to pull a cart? They will not inconvenience themselves to the slightest degree.

Karel Capek:
Quite obviously a cat trusts human beings; but she doesn't trust a cat because she knows her better than we do.

Roger A. Caras:
Cats don't like change without their consent.

Cats can be cooperative when something feels good, which, to a cat, is the way everything is supposed to feel as much of the time as possible.

William H. A. Carr:
Cats are like greatness: Some people are born into cat-loving families, some achieve cats, and some have cats thrust upon them.

Few people are mugwumps about the cat.

Winifred Carriere:
Cats always know whether people like or dislike them. They do not always care enough to do anything about it.

If a cat did not put a firm paw down now and then, how could his human remain possessed.

I suspect that many an ailurophobe hates cats only because he feels they are better than he is - more honest, more secure, more loved, more whatever he is not.

Lewis Carroll:
It is a very inconvenient habit of kittens (Alice had once made the remark) that whatever you say to them, they always purr.

Jacob Cats:
If one owns a pretty cat, it's best to avoid the furrier.

Jules Champfleury:
The love of dress is very marked in this attractive animal. He is proud of the lustre of his coat, and cannot endure that a hair of it shall lie the wrong way.

There is no more intrepid explorer than a kitten.

Emile Auguste Chartier:
Two things are aesthetically perfect in the world - the clock and the cat.

Chateaubriand:
The cat lives alone. He has no need of society. He obeys only when he wishes, he pretends to sleep the better to see, and scratches everything he can scratch.

Chaucer:
Take a cat, nourish it well with milk
And tender meat, make it a couch of silk,
But let it see a mouse along the wall
And it abandones milk and meat and all.

Winston Churchill:
I like pigs. Dogs look up to us. Cats look down on us. Pigs treat us as equals.

Seymour and Paula Chwast:
Getting a cat is a greater commitment than getting married.

Eleanor Clark:
Even the stupidest cat seems to know more than any dog.

Susy Clemens (daughter of author Mark Twain):
Momma loves morals and Papa loves cats.

Jean Cocteau:
I love my cats because I love my home, and little by little they become its visible soul.

Colette:
There are no ordinary cats.

Time spent with cats is never wasted.

By associating with the cat, one only risks becoming richer.

I am indebted to the species of the cat for a particular kind of honorable deceit, for a great control over myself, for a characteristic aversion to brutal sounds, and for the need to keep silent for long period of time.

Our perfect companions never have fewer than four feet.

My cat does not talk as respectfully to me as I do to her.

William Cowper:
A poet's cat, sedate and grave
As a poet well could wish to have...

Nelson A. Crawford:
The cat lives his own life; he expects you to live yours.

Will Cuppy:
If a cat does something, we call it instinct; if we do the same thing, for the same reason, we call it intelligence.

Patricia Dale-Green:
There is one way in which cats differ from all other animals and that is in the effect they have on human beings.

Erasmus Darwin:
To respect the cat is the beginning of the aesthetic sense.

Robertson Davies:
Authors like cats because they are such quiet, lovable, wise creatures, and cats like authors for the same reasons.

Leonardo da Vinci:
The smallest feline is a masterpiece.

James Davis, DVM: Cats are just little hair factories.

Jim Davis:
Way down deep, we're all motivated by the same urges. Cats have the courage to live by them.

Cats instinctively know the precise moment their owners will awaken...then they awaken them ten minutes earlier.

They say a cat always lands on his feet, but they don't mention the pain. (as Garfield the cat)

Miguel de Cervantes:
In the night all cats are gray.

Those who will play with cats must expect to get scratched.

Bernos de Gasztold:
Wouldn't You like someday
To put a curse on the whole race of dogs?
If so, I should say, Amen.

Jean de la Fontaine:
Cats know not how to pardon.

J. J. L. de Lalande:
I love cats, I adore cats, and may be forgiven for putting one in the sky, after sixty years of hard work.
[On his efforts to launch a cat into space]

Michel deMontaigne:
When I play with my cat, who knows if I am not a pastime for her more than she is to me?

Sidney Denham:
Cats do not go for a walk to get somewhere but to explore.

Barbara L. Diamond:
Does the father figure in your cat's life ever clean the litter box? My husband claims that men lack the scooping gene.

Blaga Dimitrova:
A cat stretches from one end of my childhood to the other.

Missy Dizick:
Some people say that cats are sneaky, evil and cruel. True, and they have many other fine qualities as well.

Question: What about the way cats claw the upholstery?
Answer: Learn to like fringe!

Rev. Orlando Thomas Dobbin:
Confound the cats! All cats--alway--
Cats of all colours, black, white, grey;
By night a nuisance and by day--
Confound the cats!

Allen and Ivy Dodd:
There are people who reshape the world by force or argument, but the cat just lies there, dozing; and the world quietly reshapes itself to suit his comfort and convenience.

Mary Abigail Dodge:
What's virtue in a man can't be vice in a cat.

Leo Dworken:
No amount of time can erase the memory of a good cat, and no amount of masking tape can ever totally remove his fur from your couch.

Warren Eckstein:
In the beginning, God created man, but seeing him so feeble, He gave him the cat.

George Eliot:
I'm not one o' those as can see the cat i' the dairy, an' wonder what she's come after.

T. S. Eliot:
When a Cat adopts you there is nothing to be done about it except to put up with it until the wind changes.

Ebenezer Elliott:
If 'twere not for my cat and dog, I think I could not live.

Lee Entrekin:
Nature abhors a vacuum, but not as much as cats do.

Evan Esar:
The cat: an animal that' so unpredictable, you can never tell in advance how it will ignore you the next time.

A creature that never cries over spilt milk: a cat.

Anthony Henderson Euwer:
Some cats is blind,
And stone-deaf some,
But ain't no cat
Wuz ever dumb.

W. C. Fields:
The clever cat eats cheese and breathes down rat holes with baited breath.

Lenore Fleischer:
When you're special to a cat, you're special indeed - she brings to you the gift of her preference of you, the sight of you, the sound of your voice, the touch of your hand.

Dr. Bruce Fogle:
While you might see a cat on a hot tin roof, a dog on a hot tin roof would be yowling its head off.

François Fossier:
Cats are forever.

Michael W. Fox, DVM:
They purr to signal a relaxed mood, And their purring may also help relax them and those around them who feel and hear their purring - like getting a nice massage in sound.

Benjamin Franklin:
The cat in gloves catches no mice.

Thomas Fuller:
Nothing's more playful than a young cat, nor more grave than an old one.

Mavis Gallant:
"What is the appeal about cats?" he said kindly. "I've always wanted to know." "They don't care i you like them. They haven't the slightest notion of gratitude, and they never pretend. They take what you have to offer, and away they go."

Paul Gallico:
I think of a woman as something like myself.
[translating from cat language]

All you have to remember is Rule 1: When in doubt - wash.

Loneliness is comforted by the closeness and touch of fur to fur, skin to skin - or skin to fur.

Georgina Strickland Gates:
Her function is to sit and be admired.

Theophile Gautier:
The cat is a dilettante in fur.

Dynasties of cats, as numerous as the dynasties of the Pharaohs, succeed each other under my roof. The memory of the cats we have lost fades like the memory of men.

Sometimes he sits at your feet looking into your face with an expression so gentle and caressing that the depth of this gaze startles you. Who can believe that there is no soul behind those luminous eyes!

It is a matter to gain the affection of a cat. He is a philosophical animal, tenacious of his own habits, fond of order and neatness, and disinclined to extravagant sentiment. He will be your friend, if he finds you worthy of friendship, but not your slave.

God has created the cat to give man the pleasure of caressing the tiger.

Delphine Gay:
The catlike man is one upon whom no tricks can be played with success.

W. L. George:
Cats know how to obtain food without labor, shelter without confinement, and love without penalties.

Alberto Giacometti:
It depends on what is in my house. If there was a cat, and my works, I would save the cat. A cat's life is more important than art.
[when asked which of his sculptures he would rescue from a fire]

Rumer Godden:
For a dyed-in-the-wool author nothing is as dead as a book once it is written...She is rather like a cat whose kittens have grown up. While they were a-growing she was passionately interested in them but now they seem hardly to belong to her - and probably she is involved with another batch of kittens as I am involved with other writing.

James Gorman:
Cats are the ultimate narcissists. You can tell this by all the time they spend on personal grooming. Dogs aren't like this. A dog's idea of personal grooming is to roll in a dead fish.

Cats don't bark and act brave when they see something small in fur or feathers - they kill it. Dogs tend to bravado. They're braggarts. In the great evolutionary drama, the dog is Sergeant Bilko, the cat is Rambo.

Bruce Graham:
Do not meddle in the affairs of cats, for they are subtle and will piss on your computer.

Paul Gray:
Cats were put into the world to disprove the dogma that all things were created to serve man.

Patricia Dale Green:
Cats have always been associated with the Moon. Like the Moon, they come to life at night, escaping from humanity and wandering over housetops with their eyes beaming out through the darkness.

Dan Greenberg:
There is, incidently, no way of talking about cats that enables one to come off as a sane person.

Cats are dangerous companions for writers because cat watching is a near-perfect method of writing avoidance.

Gilbert Gude:
Maybe in the future we should add one more question to those we ask of presidential candidates - we should ask them where they stand on cats. Better still, we should demand to see the cats these candidates say they have raised, just to make sure we are not having the fur pulled over our eyes.

Eric Gurney:
The really great thing about cats is their endless variety. One can pick a cat to fit almost any kind of decor, color scheme, income, personality, mood. But under the fur; whatever color it may be, there still lies, essentially unchanged, one of the world's free souls.

Bonni Elizabeth Hall (and Missycat):
When you come upon your cat, deep in meditation, staring thoughtfully at something that you can't see, just remember that your cat is, in fact, running the universe.

Elizabeth Hamilton:
Which is the more beautiful, feline movement or feline stillness?

Gail Hamilton:
What's virtue in a man can't be virtue in a cat.

Terri L. Haney:
Apparently, through scientific research, it has been determined that a cat's affection gland is stimulated by snoring, thus explaining my cat's uncontrollable urge to rub against my face at 2 a.m.

Okay, cats will never bring you pictures they've drawn in school, but they may give you a dead mouse. What parent could resist that gift?

Vicki Hearne:
Cats do not declare their love much; they enact it, by their myriad invocations of our pleasure.

Robert A. Heinlein:
How we behave towards cats here below determines out status in heaven.

Women and cats will do as they please, and men and dogs should relax and get used to the idea.

Ernest Hemingway:
One cat just leads to another.

A cat has absolute emotional honesty: human beings, for one reason or another, may hide their feelings, but a cat does not.

Tay Hohoff:
There are few things in life more heartwarming than to be welcomed by a cat.

Barbara Holland:
There is no 'cat language.' Painful as it is for us to admit, they don't need one!

Lynn Hollyn:
Essentially, you do not so much teach your cat as bribe him.

If left to their own devices, felines tend to nap and nibble throughout the day and night, scarcely differentiating between the two.

Geoffrey Household:
I have noticed that what cats most appreciate in a human being is not the ability to produce food which they take for granted--but his or her entertainment value.

Mildred R. Howland:
In his castle
He is King
And I his vassal.

Aldous Huxley:
If you want to be a psychological novelist and write about human beings, the best thing you can do is keep a pair of cats.

J. K. Huysmans:
In the matter of animals I love only cats, but I love them unreasonably for their qualities and in spite of their numerous faults. I have only one, but I could not live without a cat.

Lesley Anne Ivory:
Cats are glorious creatures who must on no accounts be underestimated...Their eyes are fathomless depths of cat-world mysteries.

David James:
After extensive research, I have determined that cats do have nine lives. But this has made for some awkward moments on the autopsy table since you can never really tell which life is nine.

Lillian Johnson:
Some people say man is the most dangerous animal on the planet. Obviously those people have never met an angry cat.

Michael Joseph:
Is it yet another survival of jungle instinct, this hiding away from prying eyes at important times? Or merely a gesture of independence, a challenge to man and his stupid ways?

Garrison Keilor:
Cats are intended to teach us that not everything in nature has a function.

Hank Ketchum:
Meow is like aloha - it can mean anything.

Rob Kopack:
If cats could talk, they would lie to you.

Joseph Wood Krutch:
Cats are rather delicate creatures and they are subject to a good many ailments, but I never heard of one who suffered from insomnia.

Cats seem to go on the principle that it never does any harm to ask for what you want.

William Kunstler:
A dog is like a liberal. He wants to please everybody. A cat doesn't need to know that everybody loves him.

Dilys Laing:
I put down my book, The Meaning of Zen, and see the cat smiling into her fur as she delicately combs it with her rough pink tongue. Cat, I would lend you this book to study but it appears you have already read it. She looks up and gives me her full gaze. Don't be ridiculous, she purrs, I wrote it.

William S. Landor:
Cats, like men, are flatters.

Andrew Lang:
Of all animals, the cat alone attains to the comtemplative life. He regards the wheel of existence from without, like the Buddha.

Doug Larson:
The cat could very well be man's best friend but would never stoop to admitting it.

Jay Leno:
I've never understood why women love cats. Cats are independent, they don't listen, they don't come in when you call, they like to stay out all night, and when they're home they like to be left alone and sleep. In other words, every quality that women hate in a man, they love in a cat.

Elizabeth Lemarchand:
A black cat dropped soundlessly from a high wall, like a spoonful of dark treacle, and melted under a gate.

Doris Lessing:
If a fish is the movement of water embodied, given shape, then a cat is a diagram and pattern of subtle air.

Paul Leyhausen:
Friendship between cats can exist, but more or less in the same way that it can exist for a not very sociable man who spends his time in proviking others, and who, when asked why he does not have any friends, replies: "I would like to have them?but they are so ignoble!"

If a cat is creeping up on prey and realizes that another cat is watching, it will straighten up and act disinterested.

Abraham Lincoln:
No matter how much cats fight, there always seem to be plenty of kittens.
I care not for a man's religion whose dog or cat is not the better for it.

Charles Lindbergh:
It's too dangerous a journey to risk the cat's life.
Explaining why his kitten, Patsy, didn't accompany him on his legendary transatlantic flight.

Pierre Loti:
Cats are possessed of a shy, retiring nature, cajoling, haughty, and capricious, difficult to fathom. They reveal themselves only to certain favored individuals, and are repelled by the faintest suggestion of insult or even by the most trifling deception.

Sharon Lundblad:
A cat is a very special friend who comes into your life. When it comes it brings warmth, companionship, contentment and love. Whether it's long-haired, short-haired, pedigreed or "heinz" makes no difference.
A cat, though independent, has a way of letting you know that without you life just wouldn't be worthwhile.
If you're lucky enough to own a cat consider yourself one of life's winners because when you have a cat around you'll never be lonely; the sound of its purr will give you comfort, and as you hold it and pet it, stress will slip away.

John D. MacDonald:
If a cat can detect no self-advantage in what it is being told to do, it says the hell with it, and, if pressure is brought to bear, it will grow increasingly surly and irritable to the point where it is hopeless to continue.

Larry Madrid:
If you put down food and the cat eats, it's hungry. If it doesn't, it isn't.

Steve Martin:
I gave my cat a bath the other day. He just sat there. Actually, I think he enjoyed it. It wasn't very fun for me, though. The fur kind of stuck to my tongue.

Groucho Marx:
A black cat crossing your path signifies that the animal is going somewhere.

James Mason:
Cats do not have to be show how to have a good time, for they are unfailing ingenious in that respect.

Donna McCrohan:
A cat can purr its way out of anything.

Rod McKuen:
There has never been a cat
Who couldn't calm me down
By walking slowly
Past my chair

Stuart McMillan:
A meow massages the heart.

Patricia McPherson:
I think it would be great to be a cat! You come and go as you please. People always feed and pet you. They don't expect much of you. You can play with them, and when you've had enough, you go away. You can pick and choose who you want to be around. You can't ask for more than that.

Ernest Menual:
The cat has too much spirit to have no heart.

These furry buggers are just deep, deep wells you throw all you emotions into.

Fernand Mery:
With the qualities of cleanliness, affection, patience, dignity, and courage that cats have, how many of us, I ask you, would be capable of becoming cats?

God made the cat in order that man might have the pleasure of caressing the lion.

Leonard Michaels:
Looking at a cat, like looking at clouds or stars or the ocean, makes it difficult to believe there is nothing miraculous in this world.

Bette Midler:
Cats always seem so very wise, when staring with their half-closed eyes. Can they be thinking, I'll be nice, and maybe she will feed me twice?

George Mikes:
You can keep a dog; but it is the cat who keeps people, because cats find humans useful domestic animals.

Susanne Millen:
Only cat lovers know the luxury of fur-coated, musical hot water bottles that never go cold.

St. George Mivart:
We cannot without becoming cats, perfectly understand the cat mind.

The smart cat doesn't let on that he is.

Harold Monro:
When the tea is brought at five o'clock
And all the neat curtains are drawn with care,
The little black cat with bright green eyes
Is suddenly purring there.

Lady Sydney Morgan:
The playful kitten with its pretty little tigerish gambole is infinitely more amusing than half the people one is obliged to live with in the world.

Morris the Cat:
Personally, I don't believe felines are a fad. We're here to stay.

Wright Morris:
Cats don't belong to people. They belong to places.

Desmond Morris:
Artists like cats; soldiers like dogs.

Ogden Nash:
The trouble with a Kitten is that,
Eventually....it becomes a Cat!

John S. Nichols:
Cats aren't clean, they're just covered with cat spit.

Hazel Nicholson:
A cat is a puzzle for which there is no solution.

P. J. O'Rourke:
Cats are to dogs what modern people are to the people we used to have. Cats are slimmer, cleaner, more attractive, disloyal, and lazy. Cats are irresponsible and recognize no authority, yet are completely dependent on others for their material needs. Cats cannot be made to do anything useful. Cats are mean for the fun of it. In fact, cats possess so many of the same qualities as some people (expensive girlfriends, for instance) that it's often hard to tell the people and the cats apart.

Its easy to understand why the cat has eclipsed the dog as modern America's favorite pet. People like pets to possess the same qualities they do. Cats are irresponsible and recognize no authority, yet are completely dependent on others for their material needs. Cats cannot be made to do anything useful. Cats are mean for the fun of it.

Lynn M. Osband:
The mathematical probability of a common cat doing exactly as it pleases is the one scientific absolute in the world.

Mugsy Peabody:
A dog is a dog, a bird is a bird, and a cat is a person.

Elizabeth Peters:
The cat Bastet sat perched on the rim of the tub, watching me through slitted golden eyes. She was fascinated by baths. I suppose total immersion in water must have seemed to her a peculiar method of cleansing oneself.

William Lyon Phelps:
A cat pours his body on the floor like water. It is restful just to see him.

Dave Platt:
Managing senior programmers is like herding cats.

Nan Porter:
If cats could talk, they wouldn't.

Paula Poundstone:
The problem with cats is that they get the exact same look on their faces whether they see a moth or an ax-murderer.

Francois Rene:
The cat lives alone, has no need of society, obeys only when she pleases, pretends to sleep that she may see the more clearly, and scratches everything on which she can lay her paw.

Agnes Repplier:
A kitten is chiefly remarkable for rushing about like mad at nothing whatsoever, and generally stopping before it gets there.

Faith Resnick:
People that hate cats, will come back as mice in their next life.

Jules Reynard:
The ideal of calm exists in a sitting cat.

Hank Roll:
If cats seem distant and aloof it is because this is not their native planet - they are here just to visit and dominate.

Jean Jacques Rousseau:
Watch a cat when it enters a room for the first time. It searches and smells about, it is not quiet for a moment, it trusts nothing until it has examined and made acquaintance with everything.

Saki (H. H. Munro):
The cat is domestic only as far as suits its own ends.

He seems the incarnation of everything soft and silky and velvety, without a sharp edge in his composition, a dreamer whose philosophy is sleep and let sleep.

Agnes A. Sandham:
Now, as you all know, there is nothing a cat dislikes so much as water; just watch your kitty shake her paws daintily when she steps into a puddle, and see how disgusted she is if a drop of water falls on her nose and back.

Albert Schewitzer:
There are two means of refuge from the miseries of life: music and cats.

Sir Walter Scott
Cats are a mysterious kind of folk. There is more passing in their minds than we are aware of.

William Shakespeare:
A harmless, necessary cat.

John Simon:
I have found my love of cats most helpful in understanding women.

Robert Southey:
Ah! Little do you know how swiftly fly
The venomed darts of feline jealousy.

A kitten is a rosebud in the garden of the animal kingdom.

Robert Stearns:
Among animals, cats are the top-hatted, frock-coated statesmen going about their affairs at their own pace. Dogs are the peasants, dutifully plodding behind their leaders.

Since each of us is blessed with only one life, why not live it with a cat?

A human may go for a stroll with a cat; he has to walk a dog. The cat leads the way, running ahead, tail high, making sure you understand the arrangement. If you should happen to get ahead, the cat will never allow you to think it is following you. It will stop and clean some hard-to-reach spot, or investigate a suspicious movement in the grass; you will find yourself waiting a fidgeting like the lackey you are. But this is not annoying to cat lovers, who understand and appreciate a good joke, even when it is on them.

Adlai Stevenson:
To escort a cat on a leash is against the nature of the cat.

It is in the nature of cats to do a certain amount of unescorted roaming.

Sir Harry Swanson:
You can't own a cat. The best you can do is be partners.

Arthur Symons:
It is in their eyes that their magic resides.

Gladys Tabor:
When cat people get together they are as single-minded as vegetarians, or kelp and soybean addicts. For they can talk for hours about what their cats will and will not eat. Once you meet a cat lover you will pursue his or her cat's food predilections endlessly.

Hippolyte Taine:
I have studied many philosophers and many cats. The wisdom of cats is infinitely superior.

Ann Taylor:
Dogs eat. Cats dine.

Jane Taylor:
I like little Pussy, her coat is so warm,
And if I don't hurt her she'll do me no harm.

Helen Thomson:
One is never sure, watching two cats washing each other, whether it's affection, the taste, or a trial run for the jugular.

Dr. Edward Lee Thorndike:
Never will you get a better psychological subject than a hungry cat.

Mark Twain:
If animals could speak the dog would be a blundering outspoken fellow, but the cat would have the rare grace of never saying a word too much.

Of all God's creatures, there is only one that cannot be made slave of the leash. That one is the cat. If man could be crossed with the cat it would improve the man, but it would deteriorate the cat.

A home without a cat, and a well-fed, well-petted and properly revered cat may be a perfect home, perhaps, but how can it prove its title?

A man who carries a cat by the tail learns something he can learn in no other way.

Ignorant people think it's the noise which fighting cats make that is so aggravating, but it ain't so; it's the sickening grammar they use.

One of the most striking differences between a cat and a lie is that a cat has only nine lives.

We should be careful to get out of an experience only the wisdom that is in it - and stop there; lest we be like the cat that sits down on a hot stove-lid. She will never sit down on a hot stove-lid again - and that is well; but also she will never sit down on a cold one anymore.

A cat is more intelligent than people believe, and can be taught any crime.

I simply can't resist a cat, particularly a purring one. They are the cleanest, cunningest, and most intelligent things I know, outside of the girl you love, of course.

John Updike:
A computer and a cat are somewhat alike -- they both purr, and like to be stroked, and spend a lot of the day motionless. They also have secrets they don't necessarily share.

Jeff Valdez:
Cats are smarter than dogs. You can't get eight cats to pull a sled through snow.

Cynthia E. Varnado:
It is impossible to keep a straight face in the presence of one or more kittens.

Carl van Vechten:
A cat will sit washing his face within two inches of a dog in the most frantic state of barking rage, if the dog be chained.

The cat seldom interferes with other people's rights. His intelligence keeps him from doing many of the fool things that complicate life.

Jules Verne:
I believe cats to be spirits come to earth. A cat, I am sure, could walk on a cloud without coming through.

Robert J. Vogel:
A dog is a man's best friend. A cat is a cat's best friend.

Louis Wain:
I have myself found, the result of many years enquiry and study, that all people who keep cats do not suffer from those petty ailments which all flesh is heir to.

Intelligence in the cat is underrated.

A mouse in the paws is worth two in the pantry.

Barbara Webster:
One reason we admire cats is for their proficiency in one-upmanship. They always seem to come out on top, no matter what they are doing, or pretend they do.

John Weitz:
Even overweight, cats instinctively know the cardinal rule: when fat, arrange yourself in slim poses.

Rosalind Welcher:
No one can have experienced to the fullest the true sense of achievement and satisfaction who have never pursued and successfully caught his tail.

Alfred North Whitehead:
If a dog jumps in your lap, it is because he is fond of you; but if a cat does the same thing, it is because your lap is warmer.

Mary Wilkins:
Cats love one so much - more than they will allow. But they have so much wisdom they keep it to themselves.

George F. Will:
Like a graceful vase, a cat, even when motionless, seems to flow.

The phrase "domestic cat" is an oxymoron.

Robley Wilson, Jr.:
It is remarkable, in cats, that the outer life they reveal to their master is one of perpetual confident boredom. All they betray of the hidden life is by means of symbol; if it were not for the recurring evidence of murder - the disemboweled rabbits, the headless flickers, the torn squirrels - we should forever imagine our cats to be simple pets whose highest ambition is to sleep in the best soft chair, whose worst crime is to sharpen their claws on carpeting.

Helen M. Winslow:
Women, poets, and especially artists, like cats; delicate natures only can realize their sensitive nervous systems.

P. G. Wodehouse:
The trouble with cats is that they've got no tact.

Steven Wright:
Curiosity killed the cat, but for a while I was a suspect.

Deng Xiaoping:
I don't care what color the cat is, as long as it catches the rat.

W. B. Yeats:
The eyes of a cat will wax and wane with the phases of the moon.

Kathy Young:
Cats may sense early on that you don't like paw prints on your butter, but they will jump onto any surface in the home as long as no one sees it happen.
Cats never feel threatened. They are genetically incapable of accepting that anyone could possibly dislike anything as perfect as a cat.

Cats can derive their nutrition from the air they breathe until you get the message that the Fish Fin Buffet you put in their bowl three days ago will never be acceptable.

You must set down all the rules to your cat at the beginning of your relationship. You cannot add rules as you go along. Once these rules are set, you must never, under any circumstances, break any of them. Dare to break a rule, and you will never live it down. Trust me.

PROVERBS:

If stretching were wealth, the cat would be rich. - African

A cat is a lion to a mouse. - Albanian

A cat bitten once by a snake dreads even rope. - Arabic

If you stared deep into a cat's eyes, you would be able to see into the world of spirits. - British

All cats love fish but fear to wet their paws. - Chinese

A cat assures its owner of good luck. - Chinese

Happy owner, happy cat. Indifferent owner, reclusive cat. - Chinese

He who rides the tiger finds it difficult to dismount. - Chinese

You will always be lucky if you know how to make friends with strange cats. - Colonial American

Those who dislike cats will be carried to the cemetery in the rain. - Dutch

An overdressed woman is like a cat dressed in saffron. - Egyptian

In a cat's eye, all things belong to cats. - English

A cat in grass is a tiger in the jungle. - English

Dogs remember faces, cats places. - English

The cat has nine lives - three for playing, three for straying, and three for staying. - English

For he has the subtlety and hissing of a serpent, which in goodness he suppresses. - English

Handsome cats and fat dungheaps are the sign of a good farmer - French

If cats had wings there would be no ducks in the lake. - Indian

That cat that has its mouth burned by drinking hot milk will not drink even buttermilk without first blowing upon it. - Indian

A cat is a lion in a jungle of small bushes. - Indian

The cat is magical and the bringer of good luck. - Indian

Beware of people who dislike cats. - Irish

Nature breaks through the eyes of the cat. - Irish

To kill a cat brings seventeen years of bad luck. - Irish superstition

To please himself only the cat purrs. - Irish

It is better to feed one cat than many mice. - Norwegian proverb

When the cat and mouse agree, the grocer is ruined. - Persian

A house without a dog or a cat is the house of a scoundrel. - Portugese

It is better to be a mouse in a cat's mouth than a man in a lawyer's hands. - Spanish

The cat always leaves a mark on his friend. - Spanish

When moving to a new home, always put the cat through the window instead of the door, so that it will not leave. - U.S. Superstition

A cat's a cat and that's that. - U.S. folk saying

ANONYMOUS:

There is no snooze button on a cat who wants breakfast.

There are many intelligent species in the universe. They are all owned by cats.

Dogs believe they are human. Cats believe they are God.
We humans are indeed fortunate if we happen to be chosen to be owned by a cat.

No Heaven will ever Heaven be
Unless my cats are there to welcome me.

Thousands of years ago, cats were worshipped as gods. Cats have never forgotten this.

If you take even one of a cat's nine lives, it will haunt you forever.

I got rid of my husband. The cat was allergic.

My husband said it was him or the cat. I miss him sometimes.

Curiosity was framed. Ignorance killed the cat.

Never feed your cat anything that doesn't match the carpet.

Or as Schrodinger's wife once said, "What did you do to the cat? It looks half dead."

Cat's motto: No matter what you've done wrong, always try to make it look as if the dog did it.

To respect a cat is the beginning of the aesthetic sense.

The visionary chooses a cat; the man of concrete a dog. Hamlet must have kept a cat. Platonists, or cat lovers, include sailors, painters, poets, and pickpockets. Aristotelians, or dog lovers, include soldiers, football players, and burglars.

Free to a good home - female cat or husband.
Husband says either he goes or cat goes.
Cat fixed, husband isn't.
- Ad in the Flint, Michigan Weekly World News

Don't use cats - they'll screw up your data.
- Anonymous science professor to student

Froward women were made from cats, just as most virtuous, industrious matrons were developed from beer.

I would have in my house - a reasonable woman - a cat moving among the books.

Of all the creatures in the world, cats an' women has the hardest time.

A cat knows you are the key to his happiness... a man thinks he is.

If to her share some feline errors fall,
Look in her face, and you'll forgive them all.

Here lies a pretty cat:
Its mistress, who never loved anyone,
Loved it madly;
Why bother to say so? Everyone can see it.
- Epitaph on tombstone of cat, with full-relief detail of the deceased

Outside of a cat, a book is man's best friend. Inside of a cat, it's too dark to read.
- Sign at Lilac Hedge Bookshop, Norwich, VT

Dogs have owners, cats have staff.

Avoid dogs whenever you can. Remember...Cats are poetry in motion. Dogs are gibberish in neutral.

Cat: a pygmy lion who loves mice, hates dogs, and patronizes human beings.

All children left unattended will be given a free kitten.
- Sign in a veterinarian's office

Never hold a dustbuster and a cat at the same time.
- from Advice from Kids

There was an old bulldog named Caesar,
Who went for a cat just to tease her;
But she spat and she spit,
Till the old bulldog quit.
Now when poor Caesar sees her, he flees her.

You know when people see a cat's litter box, they always say, "Oh, have you got a cat?" Just once I want to say, "No, it's for company!"

Humans: No fur, no paws, no tail. They run away from mice. They never get enough sleep. How can you help but love such an absurd animal?
- An anonymous cat on Homo sapiens

The purity of a person's heart can be quickly measured by how they regard cats.

Blessed are those who love cats, for they shall never be lonely.

When I'm in the doghouse, my cats still come to visit.

A rose has thorns, a cat has claws; certainly both are worth the risk.

There are hundreds of good reasons for having a cat, but all you need is one.

A cat is always at the wrong side of the door.

A person who manages to understand a cat is qualified to understand most anything else.

Buy a dog a toy, and he'll play with it forever. Buy a cat a present, and it will play with the wrapper for 10 minutes.

Anything on the ground is a cat toy. Anything not there yet, will be.

Cats have amazingly keen hearing but go conveniently deaf when you call.

If human, cats might play solitare, but they would never sit around with the gang and a few six-packs watching Monday Night Football. from Time Magazine, Dec.7, 1981

Cats have incredible vision - but they never see your flaws.

Cats are better than any vice. They're not fattening, dangerous, or expensive. However, they can be addictive.

A cat makes all the difference between coming home to an empty house and coming home.

Owning a cat is a good forerunner of marriage. You learn that you cannot control another living being, or expect him/her to do everything you want.

I'm not much of a cook. My favorite thing to make from scratch is a purr.

Nine lives added to my one life makes a perfect 10.

If you want a kitten, start out by asking for a horse.
- from Advice from Kids

Cats always land on their feet. Dogs won't even let you throw them.

A cat will wait until you've read your morning paper before tearing it to shreds.

Some people see the glass as half empty, some as half full. I look for the cat who drank the water.

Life is hard. Soften yours with a cat.

Said a miserly peer at the Abbey,
"I fear I shall look rather shabby,
For I've replaced my ermine,
Infested with vermin,
With the fur of my dear defunct tabby."

Happiness does not light gently on my shoulder like a butterfly. She pounces on my lap, demanding that I scratch behind her ears.

The cat stands alone, distinct ? outindividualizing every individual. from A Ship of Solace

Owning a cat is like reading a good novel - just when you think you know the main character, she'll surprise you on the very next page.

A thing of beauty, strength, and grace lies behind that whiskered face.

Cats are like music. It's foolish to try to explain their worth to those who don't appreciate them.

Cats whiskers are so sensitive, they can find their way through the narrowest crack in a broken heart.

If you want to know the character of a man, find out what his cat thinks of him

Every life should have nine cats.

It's really the cat's house. I just pay the mortgage.

A cat which is kept as a household pet may properly be considered a thing of value. It ministers to the pleasures of its owner and serves with honor.