It is the fundamental theory of all the more recent American law...that the average citizen is half-witted, and hence not to be trusted to either his own devices or his own thoughts.
H.L. Mencken
Related Either Mitt Romney through his own words and his own signature was misrepresenting his position at B... STEPHANIE CUTTER I like to open for a band as it brings on sort of a challenge and it makes things more interesting. ... KELLY JONES Treat the other man's faith gently; it is all he has to believe with. His mind was created for his ... HENRY S HASKINS Treat the other man's faith gently; it is all he has to believe with. His mind was created for his o... HENRY S. HASKINS When a legislature undertakes to proscribe the exercise of a citizen's constitutional rights it acts... WILLIAM ORVILLE DOUGLAS To be or not to be is not a question of compromise. Either you be or you don't be. GOLDA MEIR To be mad is worse than not to be if this is what it is. JOHNNY RICH All that a man achieves and all that he fails to achieve is the direct result of his own thoughts JAMES ALLEN To be, or not to be, that is the question. WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE Be kind. We never know what people are going through. Give grace and mercy because one day your circ... GERMANY KENT Kindness is universal. Sometimes being kind allows others to see the goodness in humanity through yo... GERMANY KENT Civil liberty is the status of the man who is guaranteed by law and civil institutions the exclusive... WILLIAM GRAHAM SUMNER That young man will either be killed by you or he will spend the rest of his life in prison in a cou... DAVID BAUGH The less justified a man is in claiming excellence for his own self, the more ready he is to claim a... ERIC HOFFER The love you get, is equal to the love you give. BEN OAK Integrity is not everything, but it is the only thing that matters. JEFFREY FRY The man who masters his thoughts, masters himself; and it is only on that journey that his potential... RDAMBITION He tends to own more foreign stocks than his competitors. That may be part of the explanation behind... SONYA MORRIS To be or not to be. That's not really a question. JEAN-LUC GODARD The first requisite of a good citizen in this republic of ours is that he shall be able and willing ... THEODORE ROOSEVELT Citizenship is a tough occupation which obliges the citizen to make his own informed opinion and sta... MARTHA GELLHORN Citizenship is a tough occupation which obliges the citizen to make his own informed opinion and sta... MARTHA GELLHORN Juvenile crime is not naturally born in the boy, but is largely due either to the spirit of adventur... ROBERT BADEN-POWELL Strike an average between what a woman thinks of her husband a month before she marries him and what... H.L. MENCKEN The ordinary American is the opposite of a cynic. He is on the average more of a believer and a defe... GUNNAR MYRDAL The world follows its own course. Each possesses his own thoughts, each treads his own path. So it i... HARUKI MURAKAMI The Plagiarism of orators is the art, or an ingenious and easy
mode, which some adroitly employ to ... ISAAC D'ISRAELI 37. It is better to be single and unhappy than unhappily married. JAMES C. DOBSON The good thoughts that he appreciates of others is actually his own thinking that was buzzing and wh... ANUJ SOMANY The answer to many of the domestic problems we face is not higher taxes and more spending. It is les... RICHARD M. NIXON “Behind every successful man there is a woman” --- If a husband does not sacrifice his wishes fo... MUHAMMAD ABDULLAH JAVED A person’s own opinion is the best companion of his life, but first search it on web to ensure tha... ANUJ SOMANY More often than not, positive or negative thoughts in others are viewed, valued, appreciated and tru... ANUJ SOMANY Do I have the courage of being a ruthless man to myself with the complete knowledge on my manner or ... FEREIDOON YAZDI They have to file suit or explain why they will not. In most cases a citizen is left on his own to b... CHARLOTTE BERGERON The average man plays to the gallery of his own self - esteem ELBERT HUBBARD The only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized communit... JOHN STUART MILL The Biggest Threat to our Democracy, Freedoms and Future is Leadership that fosters and Appeases the... MICHAEL HARRIS The self-confidence of the warrior is not the self-confidence of the average man. The average man se... CARLOS CASTANEDA What he truly wanted was to be left to his own devices. Not by his actual father, who could no longe... MAGGIE STIEFVATER The only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized communit... JOHN STUART MILL The final outcome cannot be known, either to the originator of a new theory, or to his colleagues an... PETER D. MITCHELL The less justified a man is in claiming excellence for his own self, the more ready he is to claim a... ERIC HOFFER Every good citizen makes his country's honor his own, and cherishes it not only as precious but as s... ANDREW JACKSON Every good citizen makes his country's honor his own, and cherishes it not only as precious but as s... ANDREW JACKSON When a citizen gives his suffrage to a man of known immorality he abuses his trust; he sacrifices no... NOAH WEBSTER The world is a looking glass. It gives back to every
man a true reflection of his own thoughts. THACKERY Be your own person, don't follow the crowd, and above all, stand out. BEN OAK The battle is not physical, it is spiritual and your mind is the battleground. Keep your mind pure a... JEANETTE CORON So it is the human condition that to wish for the greatness of one's fatherland is to wish evil to o... VOLTAIRE Being present is being connected to All Things. S. KELLEY HARRELL, M. DIV. The leftist is anti-individualistic... He is not the sort of person who has an inner sense of confid... THEODORE J. KACZYNSKI A spiritual person is also in touch with his or her own reality, feelings and thoughts, and the real... KEITH MILLER In the field of outdoor sports, the American boy is easily capable of devising his own amusements, a... JOHN MONTGOMERY WARD If the best is possible, than good is never enough and only do the best. ROBERT SIAHAAN Friendship is a double-edged sword one side it can be great and true but the other side it spells be... GARY F EVANS... Every good citizen makes his country's honor his own, and cherishes it not only as precious but ... ANDREW JACKSON The man of character is the persistent man, the man who is faithful to his own word, his own convict... MARIA MONTESSORI PEACE IS THE OBJECTIVE TO WAR, BUT THE BLOOD RUNNETH STILL NATALIE URQUIETA Hamlet's Cat's Soliloquy "To go outside, and there perchance to stay Or to re... HENRY N. BEARD To be or not to be isn't the question. The question is how to prolong being. TOM ROBBINS Now the commissioner, on his own, is announcing a new punishment, and that would be an additional pu... GERALD LEFCOURT A person whose desires and impulses are his own—are the expression of his own nature, as it has be... JOHN STUART MILL There is only one classroom in which to learn: 1. The work of God. 2. The will of God. 3. The trustw... ELISABETH ELLIOT He had the uneasy manner of a man who is not among his own kind, and who has not seen enought of the... WILLA CATHER He had the uneasy manner of a man who is not among his own kind, and who has not seen enough of the ... WILLA SIBERT CATHER How should a man be capable of grooming his own horse, or of furbishing his own spear and helmet, if... ALEXANDER THE GREAT America's story is one of expanding opportunity and suffrage, and one of our fundamental principles ... DONNA BRAZILE Every good citizen makes his country's honor his own, and cherishes it not only as precious but as s... ANDREW JACKSON The man who is forever disturbed about the condition of humanity either has no problems of his own o... HENRY MILLER Man is the individualised expression or reflection of God imaged forth and made manifest in bodily f... RALPH WALDO TRINE I know now: what is is all that matters. Not the thing you know is meant to be, not what could be, n... AUGUSTEN BURROUGHS The right of nature... is the liberty each man hath to use his own power, as he will himself, for th... THOMAS HOBBES Yes! Very funny this terrible thing is. A man that is born falls into a dream like a man who falls i... JOSEPH CONRAD Al Gore has been campaigning as his own man, speaking to the American people from his own heart and ... DOUG HATTAWAY Even when faced with his own death, he initiated the 'laughter is the best medicine' theory. KATHIE PONTUS The struggle of the male to learn to listen to and respect his own intuitive, inner prompting is the... HERB GOLDBERG Art for Duchamp, all the arts, obey the same law: meta-irony is inherent in their very spirit. It is... OCTAVIO PAZ The wise man does not lay up his own treasures. The more he gives to others, the more he has for his... LAO TZU There is no law more just, than that he, who plots death, should
perish by his own craft. UNKNOWN The unfortunate thing is that, sometimes, we slip, but, fortunately, consciously or unconsciously, w... ERNEST AGYEMANG YEBOAH To search the sands of a lost desert for truth and justice in this world today you might as well be ... GARY F EVANS... That's why we seize the moment try to freeze it and own it, squeeze it and hold it. EMINEM How should I know?" said Alice, surprised at her own courage. "It's no business of mine." The Q... LEWIS CARROLL Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not to his own facts. DANIEL PATRICK MOYNIHAN Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not his own facts. DANIEL PATRICK MOYNIHAN Let each person do his or her part. If one citizen is unwilling to participate, all of us are going ... BARBARA JORDAN The pain of the narcissist is that, to him, everything is really a threat. What doesn't surrender in... CRISS JAMI ...the more I see the better satisfied I am that I am an American; free born and free bred, where I ... THEODORE ROOSEVELT The notion that a radical is one who hates his country is naive and usually idiotic. He is, more li... H.L. MENCKEN The notion that a radical is one who hates his country is naïve and usually idiotic. He is, more li... H.L. MENCKEN It is not permitted to the most equitable of men to be a judge in his own cause. BLAISE PASCAL George had taken off all ten of his fingers and tied them into a bundle with what appeared to be eit... ALAN GOLDSHER I think that many people will intentionally overlook all of the lifeless facts about their relations... C. JOYBELL C. Life is not a game. Still, in this life, we choose the games we live to play. J.R. RIM For someone who is far from God, silence is a difficult confrontation with his own self and with the... ROBERT SARAH All I ever did to that apartment was hang fifty yards of yellow theatrical silk across the bedroom w... JOAN DIDION We can never make proper goodbyes. It was your last ride in a Checker cab and you had no warning. It... COLSON WHITEHEAD A man is a better citizen of the United States for being also a loyal citizen of his state and of hi... LOUIS D. BRANDEIS Today is about the now, the moment you live in, so do now what you want to do SOTONYE ANGA
More H.L. Mencken
Strike an average between what a woman thinks of her husband a month before she marries him and what... H.L. MENCKEN We must respect the other fellow's religion, but only in the sense and to the extent that we respect... H.L. MENCKEN If this is so, why should any man bother about moral rules and regulations? Why should any man confo... H.L. MENCKEN There is something poignantly pathetic in the picture of this valiant fighter—this arrogant ja-sag... H.L. MENCKEN It is hard to tell if a man is telling the truth when you know you would lie if you were in his plac... H.L. MENCKEN In the present case it is a little inaccurate to say I hate everything. I am strongly in favor of co... H.L. MENCKEN Democracy is a pathetic belief in the collective wisdom of individual ignorance. No one in this worl... H.L. MENCKEN As democracy is perfected, the office of president represents, more and more closely, the inner soul... H.L. MENCKEN The kind of man who wants the government to adopt and enforce his ideas is always the kind of man wh... H.L. MENCKEN As I grow older I am unpleasantly impressed by the fact that giving each human being but one life is... H.L. MENCKEN ONE OF the most irrational of all the conventions of modern society is the one to the effect that re... H.L. MENCKEN The urge to save humanity is almost always only a false-face for the urge to rule it. Power is what ... H.L. MENCKEN Indeed it may be said with some confidence that the average man never really thinks from end to end ... H.L. MENCKEN Penetrating so many secrets, we cease to believe in the unknowable. But there it sits nevertheless, ... H.L. MENCKEN The urge to save humanity is almost always only a false-face for the urge to rule it. H.L. MENCKEN Under democracy one party always devotes its chief energies to trying to prove that the other party ... H.L. MENCKEN Moral certainty is always a sign of cultural inferiority. The more uncivilized the man, the surer he... H.L. MENCKEN We are here and it is now. Further than that, all human knowledge is moonshine. H.L. MENCKEN Self-respect--the secure feeling that no one, as yet, is suspicious. H.L. MENCKEN A philosopher is a blind man in a dark room looking for a black cat that isn't there. A theologian i... H.L. MENCKEN It is often argued that religion is valuable because it makes men good, but even if this were true i... H.L. MENCKEN An idealist is one who, on noticing that a rose smells better than a cabbage, concludes that it make... H.L. MENCKEN The New Deal began, like the Salvation Army, by promising to save humanity. It ended, again like the... H.L. MENCKEN People constantly speak of "the government" doing this or that, as they might speak of God doing it.... H.L. MENCKEN The worst government is the most moral. One composed of cynics is often very tolerant and humane. Bu... H.L. MENCKEN All government, in its essence, is organized exploitation, and in virtually all of its existing form... H.L. MENCKEN Government, in its very essence, is opposed to all increase in knowledge. Its tendency is always to... H.L. MENCKEN I believe there is a limit beyond which free speech cannot go, but it's a limit that's very seldom m... H.L. MENCKEN The only kind of freedom that the mob can imagine is freedom to annoy and oppress its betters, and t... H.L. MENCKEN All I ask is equal freedom. When it is denied, as it always is, I take it anyhow. H.L. MENCKEN Under democracy one party always devotes its chief energies to trying to prove that the other party ... H.L. MENCKEN Democracy is the art of running the circus from the monkey cage. H.L. MENCKEN Of government, at least in democratic states, it may be said briefly that it is an agency engaged wh... H.L. MENCKEN Demagogue: one who preaches doctrines he knows to be untrue to men he knows to be idiots. H.L. MENCKEN The idea that the sole aim of punishment is to prevent crime is obviously grounded upon the theory t... H.L. MENCKEN We suffer most when the White House busts with ideas. H.L. MENCKEN To wage a war for a purely moral reason is as absurd as to ravish a woman for a purely moral reason. H.L. MENCKEN War will never cease until babies begin to come into the world with larger cerebrums and smaller adr... H.L. MENCKEN The notion that a radical is one who hates his country is naive and usually idiotic. He is, more li... H.L. MENCKEN No one ever heard of the truth being enforced by law. Whenever the secular arm is called in to susta... H.L. MENCKEN The only good bureaucrat is one with a pistol at his head. Put it in his hand and it's good-by to th... H.L. MENCKEN It is the invariable habit of bureaucracies, at all times and everywhere, to assume...that every cit... H.L. MENCKEN The difference between a moral man and a man of honor is that the latter regrets a discreditable ac... H.L. MENCKEN A judge is a law student who marks their own examination papers. H.L. MENCKEN Faith may be defined briefly as an illogical belief in the occurrence of the improbable. H.L. MENCKEN A great literature is chiefly the product of inquiring minds in revolt against the immovable certain... H.L. MENCKEN All human progress, even in morals, has been the work of men who have doubted the current moral valu... H.L. MENCKEN It is common to assume that human progress affects everyone- that even the dullest man, in these bri... H.L. MENCKEN Every failure teaches a man something, to wit, that he will probably fail again. H.L. MENCKEN Nature abhors a moron. H.L. MENCKEN No one in this world, so far as I know- and I have researched the records for years, and employed ag... H.L. MENCKEN The world always makes the assumption that the exposure of an error is identical with the discovery ... H.L. MENCKEN God is the immemorial refuge of the incompetent, the helpless, the miserable. They find not only sa... H.L. MENCKEN Philosophy consists very largely of one philosopher arguing that all other philosophers are jackasse... H.L. MENCKEN No matter how happily a woman may be married, it always pleases her to discover that there is a nice... H.L. MENCKEN And what is a good citizen? Simply one who never says, does or thinks anything that is unusual. Sc... H.L. MENCKEN We must think of human progress, not as of something going on in the race in general, but as somethi... H.L. MENCKEN The psychologists and the metaphysicians wrangle endlessly over the nature of the thinking process i... H.L. MENCKEN Every step in human progress, from the first feeble stirrings in the abyss of time, has been opposed... H.L. MENCKEN The human race is divided into two sharply differentiated and mutually antagonistic classes, almost ... H.L. MENCKEN Any man who inflicts the human race with ideas must be prepared to see them misunderstood. H.L. MENCKEN There is only one honest impulse at the bottom of Puritanism, and that is the impulse to punish the ... H.L. MENCKEN Puritanism: The haunting fear that someone, somewhere, may be happy. H.L. MENCKEN It is only doubt that creates. It is only the minority that counts. H.L. MENCKEN The true function of art is to...edit nature and so make it coherent and lovely. The artist is a so... H.L. MENCKEN To denounce moralizing out of hand is to pronounce a moral judgment. H.L. MENCKEN All government, in its essence, is a conspiracy against the superior man: its one permanent object i... H.L. MENCKEN Every normal man must be tempted, at times, to spit on his hands, hoist the black flag, and begin sl... H.L. MENCKEN When somebody says it’s not about the money, it’s about the money. H.L. MENCKEN I am suspicious of all the things that the average people believes. H.L. MENCKEN A cynic is a man who, when he smells flowers, looks around for a coffin. H.L. MENCKEN The most erroneous assumption is to the effect that the aim of public education is to fill the young... H.L. MENCKEN The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed{and hence the clamorous to be le... H.L. MENCKEN The older I grow, the more I distrust the familiar doctrine that age brings wisdom. H.L. MENCKEN The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led t... H.L. MENCKEN It is the natural tendency of the ignorant to believe what is not true. In order to overcome that te... H.L. MENCKEN For men become civilized, not in proportion to their willingness to believe, but in proportion to th... H.L. MENCKEN The most costly of all follies is to believe passionately in the palpably not true. It is the chief... H.L. MENCKEN What I'd like to read is a scientific review, by a scientific psychologist--if any exists--of 'A Sci... H.L. MENCKEN Nevertheless, it is even harder for the average ape to believe that he has descended from man. H.L. MENCKEN Giving every man a vote has no more made men wise and free than Christianity has made them good. H.L. MENCKEN The trouble with Communism is the Communists, just as the trouble with Christianity is the Christian... H.L. MENCKEN Where is the graveyard of dead gods? What lingering mourner waters their mounds? There was a time wh... H.L. MENCKEN The best teacher is not the one who knows most but the one who is most capable of reducing knowledge... H.L. MENCKEN One horse-laugh is worth ten-thousand syllogisms. H.L. MENCKEN If, after I depart this vale, you ever remember me and have thought to please my ghost, forgive some... H.L. MENCKEN The notion that a radical is one who hates his country is naïve and usually idiotic. He is, more li... H.L. MENCKEN The opera…is to music what a bawdy house is to a cathedral. H.L. MENCKEN When I die I shall be content to vanish into nothingness.... No show, however good, could conceivabl... H.L. MENCKEN Explanations exist; they have existed for all time; there is always a well-known solution to every h... H.L. MENCKEN The most dangerous man to any government is the man who is able to think things out for himself, wit... H.L. MENCKEN I believe that religion, generally speaking, has been a curse to mankind — that its modest and gre... H.L. MENCKEN Conscience is the inner voice that warns us somebody may be looking. H.L. MENCKEN He believed that there was need in the world for a class freed from the handicap of law and morality... H.L. MENCKEN When we consider the fact that the spectroscope has enabled us to make a chemical analysis of the su... H.L. MENCKEN He sees daily evidence that many things held to be true by nine-tenths of all men are, in reality, f... H.L. MENCKEN In the superman Nietzsche gave the world a conceivable and possible goal for all human effort. But t... H.L. MENCKEN Nietzsche, an infinitely harder and more courageous intellect, was incapable of any such confusion o... H.L. MENCKEN Yet the same thing happens to the notions of morality. They are devised, at the start, as measures o... H.L. MENCKEN Misogynist: A man who hates women as much as women hate one another. H.L. MENCKEN Puritanism: The haunting fear that someone, somewhere, may be happy. H.L. MENCKEN The plain fact is that education is itself a form of propaganda - a deliberate scheme to outfit the ... H.L. MENCKEN The essence of science is that it is always willing to abandon a given idea for a better one; the es... H.L. MENCKEN It is now quite lawful for a Catholic woman to avoid pregnancy by a resort to mathematics, though sh... H.L. MENCKEN Happiness is the china shop; love is the bull. H.L. MENCKEN I know some who are constantly drunk on books as other men are drunk on whiskey. H.L. MENCKEN Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want and deserve to get it good and ha... H.L. MENCKEN No one in this world, so far as I know—and I have searched the record for years, and employed agen... H.L. MENCKEN You never push a noun against a verb without trying to blow up something. H.L. MENCKEN He writes the worst English that I have ever encountered. It reminds me of a string of wet sponges; ... H.L. MENCKEN There are two kinds of Europeans: The smart ones, and those who stayed behind. H.L. MENCKEN the average man does not want to be free. he simply wants to be safe. H.L. MENCKEN Here is something that the psychologists have so far neglected: the love of ugliness for its own sak... H.L. MENCKEN Equality before the law is probably forever unattainable. It is a noble ideal, but it can never be r... H.L. MENCKEN Under democracy one party always devotes it's chief energies to prove that the other party is unfit ... H.L. MENCKEN The average newspaper, especially of the better sort, has the intelligence of a hillbilly evangelist... H.L. MENCKEN A newspaper is a device for making the ignorant more ignorant and the crazy crazier. H.L. MENCKEN There is reinforcement in such familiar back-formations as Chinee from Chinese, Portugee from Portug... H.L. MENCKEN American journalism (like the journalism of any other country) is predominantly paltry and worthless... H.L. MENCKEN Government today is growing too strong to be safe. There are no longer any citizens in the world the... H.L. MENCKEN That's the good thing about it. Nothing counts except what's goin' on around you. H.L. DAVIS You're kind and patient and honorable, and yes, maybe those aren't flashy, magical, extraordinary tr... H.L. BURKE A peaceful feeling: A happy harmony or symphony of all of our character pieces working in powerful u... H.L. BALCOMB ART happens every time we live in the spirit of the moment’s greatness" from Cinderella in Focus H.L. BALCOMB If religion is understanding God in the collective stories of life, then spirituality is finding God... H.L. BALCOMB When a mother elevates her communication, she naturally elevates the outcomes of her child's life si... H.L. BALCOMB The smaller the item of gratitude, the purer is the connection to our heart. H.L. BALCOMB Vulnerability along with a sense of humility are the purest forms of strength. H.L. BALCOMB Her smile makes me feel like a million little stars have just found their home in the gravitational ... H.L. BALCOMB We need to be wise consumers of information in an age of artificially created reality, written by pr... H.L. WEGLEY As democracy is perfected, the office of the president represents, more and more closely, the inner ... HL MENCKEN Honor is simply the morality of superior men. H. L. MENCKEN A man may be a fool and not know it, but not if he is married. H. L. MENCKEN There is always an easy solution to every problem - neat, plausible, and wrong. H. L. MENCKEN Temptation is a woman's weapon and man's excuse. H. L. MENCKEN For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong. H. L. MENCKEN The urge to save humanity is almost always a false front for the urge to rule. H. L. MENCKEN A newspaper is a device for making the ignorant more ignorant and the crazy crazier. H. L. MENCKEN A good politician is quite as unthinkable as an honest burglar. H. L. MENCKEN Every normal man must be tempted, at times, to spit on his hands, hoist the black flag, and begin sl... H. L. MENCKEN Love is like war: easy to begin but very hard to stop. H. L. MENCKEN On one issue, at least, men and women agree; they both distrust women. H. L. MENCKEN Most people are unable to write because they are unable to think, and they are unable to think becau... HENRY LOUIS MENCKEN The most valuable of all human possessions, next to a superior and disdainful air, is the reputation... H. L. MENCKEN Science, at bottom, is really anti-intellectual. It always distrusts pure reason, and demands the pr... HENRY LOUIS MENCKEN Nothing is so abject and pathetic as a politician who has lost his job, save only a retired stud-hor... H. L. MENCKEN A politician is an animal which can sit on a fence and yet keep both ears to the ground. H. L. MENCKEN One horse-laugh is worth ten thousand syllogisms. It is not only more effective; it is also vastly ... H. L. MENCKEN I believe that it is better to tell the truth than a lie. I believe it is better to be free than to ... H. L. MENCKEN Time stays, we go. H. L. MENCKEN A nun, at best, is only half a woman, just as a priest is only half a man. H. L. MENCKEN The truth is, as every one knows, that the great artists of the world are never Puritans, and seldom... H. L. MENCKEN Archbishop -- A Christian ecclesiastic of a rank superior to that attained by Christ. H. L. MENCKEN A church is a place in which gentlemen who have never been to heaven brag about it to persons who wi... H. L. MENCKEN All the political seers and sorcerers seem to be agreed that the coming Presidential campaign will b... H. L. MENCKEN The time must come inevitably when mankind shall surmount the imbecility of religion, as it has surm... H. L. MENCKEN The chief knowledge that a man gets from reading books is the knowledge that very few of them are wo... H. L. MENCKEN There are two kinds of books. Those that no one reads and those that no one ought to read. H. L. MENCKEN There are people who read too much: bibliobibuli. I know some who are constantly drunk on books, as ... H. L. MENCKEN War will never cease until babies begin to come into the world with larger cerebrums and smaller adr... H. L. MENCKEN Love is an emotion that is based on an opinion of women that is impossible for those who have had an... H. L. MENCKEN Love is the delusion that one man or woman differs from another. H. L. MENCKEN To be in love is merely to be in a perpetual state of anesthesia. H. L. MENCKEN I write in order to attain that feeling of tension relieved and function achieved which a cow enjoys... H. L. MENCKEN I go on working for the same reason that a hen goes on laying eggs. H. L. MENCKEN If I ever marry it will be on a sudden impulse, as a man shoots himself. H. L. MENCKEN Whenever a husband and wife begin to discuss their marriage they are giving evidence at a coroner's ... H. L. MENCKEN The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed [and hence clamorous to be led t... H. L. MENCKEN We must respect the other fellow's religion, but only in the sense that we respect his theory that ... H. L. MENCKEN It is a sin to believe in the evil of others, but it is seldom a mistake. H. L. MENCKEN Under democracy, one party always devotes its chief energies to trying to prove that the other party... H. L. MENCKEN We must be willing to pay a price for freedom. H. L. MENCKEN No man could bring himself to reveal his true character, and, above all, his true limitations as a c... H. L. MENCKEN School-days, I believe, are the unhappiest in the whole span of human existence. They are full of du... H. L. MENCKEN Let's not burn the universities yet. After all, the damage they do might be worse. H. L. MENCKEN The aim of public education is not to spread enlightenment at all: it is simply to reduce as many in... H. L. MENCKEN The worst government is the most moral. One composed of cynics is often very tolerant and humane. B... HENRY LOUIS MENCKEN Democracy is the art and science of running the circus from the monkey cage. HENRY LOUIS MENCKEN The curse of man, and the cause of nearly all his woe, is his stupendous capacity for believing the ... H. L. MENCKEN It is a sin to believe evil of others, but it is seldom a mistake. H. L. MENCKEN Fame: an embalmer trembling with stage fright. H. L. MENCKEN A celebrity is one who is known to many persons he is glad he doesn't know. HENRY LOUIS MENCKEN So few men are really worth knowing, that it seems a shameful waste to let an anthropoid prejudice s... H. L. MENCKEN One may no more live in the world without picking up the moral prejudices of the world than one will... H. L. MENCKEN The urge to save humanity is almost always only a false face for the urge to rule it. H. L. MENCKEN Man is always looking for someone to boast to; woman is always looking for a shoulder to put her hea... H. L. MENCKEN A man's women folk, whatever their outward show of respect for his merit and authority, always regar... H. L. MENCKEN Men have a much better time of it than women. For one thing, they marry later, for another thing, th... H. L. MENCKEN Man weeps to think that he will die so soon; woman, that she was born so long ago. H. L. MENCKEN Bachelors have consciences, married men have wives. H. L. MENCKEN Bachelors know more about women than married men; if they didn't, they'd be married too. H. L. MENCKEN It is impossible to believe that the same God who permitted His own son to die a bachelor regards ce... H. L. MENCKEN To the best of my knowledge and belief, the average American newspaper, even of the so-called better... H. L. MENCKEN The opera is to music what a bawdy house is to a cathedral. H. L. MENCKEN Time is the great equalizer in the field of morals. H. L. MENCKEN The difference between a moral man and a man of honor is that the latter regrets a discreditable act... H. L. MENCKEN Morality is the theory that every human act must be either right or wrong, and that 99% of them are ... H. L. MENCKEN Moral certainty is always a sign of cultural inferiority. The more uncivilized the man, the surer he... H. L. MENCKEN The average man does not get pleasure out of an idea because he thinks it is true; he thinks it is t... H. L. MENCKEN Women have simple tastes. They get pleasure out of the conversation of children in arms and men in l... H. L. MENCKEN