Mark Twain Quotes
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Tom appeared on the sidewalk with a bucket of whitewash and a long-handled brush. He surveyed the fence, and all gladness left him and a deep melancholy settled down upon his spirit. Thirty yards of board fence nine feet high. Life to him seemed hollow, and existence but a burden.
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Get a bicycle. You will not regret it, if you live.
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....it is not wise to keep the fire going under a slander unless you can get some large advantage out of keeping it alive. Few slanders can stand the wear of silence.
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In the first place, God made idiots. That was for practice. Then he made school boards.
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George Washington, as a boy, was ignorant of the commonest accomplishments of youth. He could not even lie.
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Words are only painted fire; a look is the fire itself.
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Sometimes too much to drink is barely enough.
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When a person cannot deceive himself the chances are against his being able to deceive other people.
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The finest clothing made is a person's own skin, but, of course, society demands something more than this.
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Work is a necessary evil to be avoided.
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Herodotus says, 'Very few things happen at the right time, and the rest do not happen at all. The conscientious historian will correct these defects.'
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Enough, enough, enough! Say no more! Lump the whole thing! say that the Creator made Italy from designs by Michael Angelo!
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Brooklyn praise is half slander.
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Appendix D, The Awful German Language
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James Ross Clemens, a cousin of mine, was seriously ill two or three weeks ago in London, but is well now. The report of my illness grew out of his illness; the report of my death was an exaggeration.
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'We consciously or unconsciously pay more attention to tuning our opinions to our neighbor’s pitch and preserving his approval than we do to examining the opinions searchingly and seeing to it that they are right and sound.
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He George Washington Cable has taught me to abhor and detest the Sabbath day and hunt up new and troublesome ways to dishonor it.
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If you hold a cat by the tail you learn things you cannot learn any other way.
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The minister gave out his text and droned along monotonously through an argument that was so prosy that many a head by and by began to nod - and yet it was an argument that dealt in limitless fire and brimstone and thinned the predestined elect down to a company so small as to be hardly worth the saving.
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No doubt the great majority of them are in the cemetery long ago, and I suppose the rest of us will join them before long. Speaking for myself I am willing; in fact I believe I have been willing ever since I was eighteen years old; not urgent, but willing, merely willing.
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Never pick a fight with people who buy ink by the barrel.
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I am always reading immoral books on the sly, and then selfishly trying to prevent other people from having the same wicked good time.
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Compliments make me vain: & when I am vain, I am insolent & overbearing. It is a pity, too, because I love compliments. I love them even when they are not so. My child, I can live on a good compliment two weeks with nothing else to eat.
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I was gratified to be able to answer promptly, and I did. I said I didn't know.