quotations about cats
It had need to be a wiley mouse that should breed in the cats ear.
JOHN HEYWOOD
Proverbs
Nothing's more playful than a young cat, nor more grave than an old one.
THOMAS FULLER
Gnomologia
Dogs have Masters. Cats have staff.
ANONYMOUS
A cat is not merely diverted by everything that moves, but is convinced that all nature is occupied exclusively with catering to her diversion.
FRANCOIS AUGUSTE PARADIS DE MONCRIF
attributed, The Fireside Sphinx
There is nothing quite like the presence of a cat in the house to make you feel at home, whether it's a mansion or the tiniest inner city apartment, a rustic cabin or royal palace. Cats are like a little bit of heaven on earth, their purring not unlike the stir of angel wings.
THERESA MANCUSO
Cats Do It Better Than People
Dogs love you no matter what, because God made them that way. They are pack animals and will always choose to be with their particular pack of humans no matter how they are treated. Cats are discriminating and hold you to a higher standard. You have to earn their trust and a certain amount of pride can be taken in the achievement.
DEBRA DEBLOCK-HAYFORD
Cold Paws
Cat's are unpredictable. It is a fine line between the cure, inquisitive and innocent creature resting on our lap and the hissing, spitting and deranged banshee it might become at any moment. This is why we're trying always to win their love.
GEORGE TAKEI
Oh Myyy!
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 mind. They realize that, whether they like it or not, they are simply going to have to put up with what to them are excruciatingly slow mental processes, that we humans have embarrassingly low I.Q.'s, and that probably because of these defects, we have an infuriating inability to understand, let alone follow, even the simplist and most explicit of directions.
CLEVELAND AMORY
The Cat Who Came for Christmas
Domesticated felines remain "part-kitten" all through their lives, and even though they may be middle-aged in feline terms they still look upon their human owners as their mothers.
DESMOND MORRIS
Catlore
I think all cats are wild. They only act tame if there's a saucer of milk in it for them.
DOUGLAS ADAMS
Last Chance to See
Cats seem to go on the principle that it never does any harm to ask for what you want.
JOSEPH WOOD KRUTCH
The Twelve Seasons
Men prefer pets they can control, like dogs. They can't handle that "get stuffed" stare from a cat.
CELIA HAMMOND
Evening Standard Magazine, Mar. 26, 1999
Walking is a human habit into which dogs readily fall but it is a distasteful form of exercise to a cat unless he has a purpose in view.
CARL VAN VECHTEN
attributed, Plain and Fancy Cats
We sleep researchers like cats, you know; they sleep a lot!
URSULA K. LE GUIN
The Lathe of Heaven
The trouble with a kitten is
That
Eventually it becomes a
Cat.
OGDEN NASH
"The Kitten," The Face Is Familiar
Having a bunch of cats around is good. If you're feeling bad, you just look at the cats, you'll feel better, because they know that everything is, just as it is. There's nothing to get excited about. They just know. They're saviors. The more cats you have, the longer you live. If you have a hundred cats, you'll live ten times longer than if you have ten. Someday this will be discovered, and people will have a thousand cats and live forever. It's truly ridiculous.
CHARLES BUKOWSKI
Interview Magazine, Sep. 1987
Cats are like tiny, judgmental camels. Owing to their super-efficient kidneys, the "treasure" they bury in the litter box has much less water in it than what we flush down the toilet. Their kidneys are so good that a cat can get all the water they need from a hearty meat-based diet. They can even drink seawater and re-hydrate themselves with no ill effects.
BRITTNEY BOROWLEC
Massive Science, July 16, 2019
Cats kept their secrets; they yielded to no one.
ELIZABETH REDFERN
Music of the Spheres
Male or female, a cat will show you how it feels about you. People hide their feelings for various reasons, but cats never do.
LEICESTER HEMINGWAY
My Brother
Tens of millions of people have lived side by side with tens of millions of cats for a very long time--4,000 years is the generally accepted length of time that we can trace our relationship with them. However, cats never became as fully domesticated as dogs, nor did we ever develop a hierarchical relationship where we became the "masters" of cats.... Cats have lived as solitary hunters for most of their ancestry. Early cats in the wild didn't depend on any other creature for their comfort and survival--not their own kind, not humankind. So what we may interpret as "aloofness" or "indifference" is really just self-sufficiency--a self reliance that has been in their genes and stood them in good stead for centuries. Cats are programmed to rely on their own skills and judgment, never depending on a leader or a group to help them make decisions. Cats do not look to us for supervision or permission, they don't turn to us for affirmation, nor do they accept training, by and large.
TRACIE HOTCHNER
The Cat Bible