I love you and, because I love you, I would sooner have you hate me for telling you the truth than adore me for telling you lies. Pietro Aretino
Personally, I would sooner have written Alice in Wonderland than the whole Encyclopedia Britannica. Stephen Leacock
He would say that God had given him a tail to keep, but he would sooner have had no tail and no flies - Benjamin the Donkey. George Orwell
It may be that apartheid brings such stupendous economic advantages to countries that they would sooner have apartheid than permit its destruction. Oliver Tambo
I think, at any day throughout his long reign, the King would sooner have lost his crown than have lost sight of the Beautiful Mountains. Dinah Craik
She would gladly have been more to him than she could be - because she felt (she did not deny it to herself) that she would sooner have been his wife than Leonard's. But why, because they could not be all to one another, must they be as nothing? James Anthony Froude