50 Of The Very Best Cat Quotes

From Charles Dickens or the Bronte sisters to Benjamin Franklin and Abraham Lincoln, there are many famous individuals who were (and some still are) great lovers of cats. 

Naturally, some of the best cat quotes come from writers and poets. But in today’s post, we also included some by actors, artists, as well as scientists. 

We also couldn’t leave out some cat quotes that have been around for hundreds of years, whether proverbs or sayings by people whose identity we will never know. 

Without further ado, here are more than fifty of the best cat quotes in the world. 

Best Cat Quotes By Writers & Poets

• “What greater gift than the love of a cat.” – Charles Dickens
• “A cat will be your friend, but never your slave.” – Theophile Gautier
• “As every cat owner knows, nobody owns a cat.” – Ellen Perry Berkeley
• “The only thing a cat worries about is what’s happening right now.” – Lloyd Alexander
• “Cats have it all: admiration, an endless sleep, and company only when they want it.” – Rod McKuen
• “Are cats strange animals or do they so resemble us that we find them curious as we do monkeys?” – John Steinbeck
• “A man who carries a cat by the tail learns something he can learn in no other way.” – Mark Twain
• “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.” – Mark Twain
• “When Rome burned, the emperor’s cats still expected to be fed on time.” – Seanan McGuire
• “A kitten is, in the animal world, what a rosebud is in the garden.” – Robert Southey
• “In ancient times cats were worshipped as gods; they have not forgotten this.” – Terry Pratchett
• “Cats will amusingly tolerate humans only until someone comes up with a tin opener that can be operated with a paw.” – Terry Pratchett
• “A cat has absolute emotional honesty: human beings, for one reason or another, may hide their feelings, but a cat does not.” – Ernest Hemingway
• “There are no ordinary cats.” – Sidonie-Gabrielle Colette
• “In nine lifetimes, you’ll never know as much about your cat as your cat knows about you.” – Michel de Montaigne
• “God made the cat to give humankind the pleasure of caressing the tiger.” – Victor Hugo
• “Guilt isn’t in cat vocabulary. They never suffer remorse for eating too much, sleeping too long, or hogging the warmest cushion in the house. They welcome every pleasurable moment as it unravels and savours it to the full until a butterfly or falling leaf diverts their attention. They don’t waste energy counting the number of calories they’ve consumed or the hours they’ve frittered away sunbathing.” – Helen Brown
• “Cats must have three names – an everyday name, such as Peter; a more particular, dignified name, such as Quaxo, Bombalurina, or Jellylorum; and thirdly, the name the cat thinks up for himself, his deep and inscrutable singular Name.” – T.S. Eliot
• “No man ever dared to manifest his boredom so insolently as does a Siamese tomcat when he yawns in the face of his amorously importunate wife.” – Aldous Huxley
• “I have lived with several Zen masters – all of them cats.” – Eckhart Tolle
• “When anyone mistreats it, the cat wants nothing more to do with that person and will remember him or her for a long time. It doesn’t believe in the doctrine of turning the other cheek and won’t pretend that it does.” – Jerome K. Jerome
• “Authors like cats because they are such quiet, lovable, wise creatures, and cats like authors for the same reasons.” – Robertson Davies
• “I have studied many philosophers and cats. The wisdom of cats is infinitely superior.” – Hippolyte A. Taine
• “When I am feeling low all I have to do is watch my cats, and my courage returns.” – Charles Bukowski
• “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 saviours.” – Charles Bukowski

Cat Quotes By Actors

• “The problem with cats is that they get the same exact look whether they see a moth or an axe-murderer.” – Paula Poundstone
• “Cats do not have to be shown how to have a good time, for they are unfailingly ingenious in that respect.” – James Mason
• “I had been told that the training procedure with cats was difficult. It’s not. Mine had me trained in two days.” – Bill Dana

Cat Quotes By Artists

• “If cats could talk, they wouldn’t.” – Nan Porter
• “Like all pure creatures, cats are practical.” – William S. Burroughs
• “The smallest feline is a masterpiece.” – Leonardo da Vinci
• “Cats are kindly masters, just so long as you remember your place.” – Paul Gray
• “Books. Cats. Life is good.” – Edward Gorey

Cat Quotes By Politicians

• “A countryman between two lawyers is like a fish between two cats.” – Benjamin Franklin
• “No matter how much cats fight, there always seems to be plenty of kittens.” – Abraham Lincoln
• “We have three cats. It’s like having children, but there is no tuition involved.” – Ronald Reagan

Cat Quotes By scientists, Historians, Vets, and Researchers

• “There are two means of refuge from the miseries of life: music and cats.” – Albert Schweitzer
• “If cats could write history, their history would be mostly about cats.” – Eugen Weber
• “Cats are connoisseurs of comfort.” – James Herriot
• “If a dog jumps into 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.” – A.N. Whitehead
• “Time spent with cats is never wasted.” – Sigmund Freud

Cat Quotes By Unknown Authors

• “For a man to truly understand rejection, he must first be ignored by a cat.”
• “Cats leave paw prints in your heart, forever and always.” 
• “Beware of people who dislike cats.” – Irish proverb
• “A cat has nine lives. For three he plays, for three he strays, and for the last three he stays.” – English proverb
• “No home is complete without the pitter-patter of kitty feet.” 
• “People who don’t like cats were probably mice in an earlier life.”
• “Dogs have owners, cats have staff.”
• “Heaven will never be Paradise unless my cats are there waiting for me.”
• “When the cat you love becomes a memory, the memory becomes a treasure.”
• “No one can truly understand the bond we form with the cats we love until they experience the loss of one.”
• “One day, all the cats we’ve ever loved will all come running towards us, and that day will be a good day.”
• “It is, in fact, the cat’s house. We only pay the mortgage.”
• “I was normal three cats ago.”
• “An inquisitive kitten is the best reminder of what youth is all about.”
• “There are many intelligent creatures in the universe, and they are all owned by cats.” 
• “It’s very hard to be polite if you’re a cat.”
• “Every life should have nine cats.”
• “If you can remember how many cats you have, you don’t have enough.”
• “My cat knows the song in my heart and purrs it to me when my memory fails.”
• “A cat keeps her claws sharp because she knows a purr might not be enough.”
• “A cute expression and a purr, and the latest shredding incident is forgiven.”