Authors:

A
B
C
D
E
F
G
H
I
J
K
L
M
N
O
P
Q
R
S
T
U
V
W
X
Y
Z

H. L. Mencken Quotes - Page 12

All Quotes Achievement Adultery Adventure Age Alcohol Arguing Art Atheism Atheist Beer Belief Business Change Character Children Choices College Comedy Common Sense Communism Conscience Conspiracy Cooking Country Courage Criticism Critics Culture Cynicism Death Democracy Determination Devil Difficulty Dignity Doubt Drinking Dying Earth Education Effort Ethics Evil Exercise Faith Fear Feelings Fighting Food Free Speech Freedom Funny Genius Giving God Golf Happiness Hate Heart Heaven Hell History Home Honesty Honor House Humanity Husband Ignorance Imagination Inspirational Intelligence Intuition Journalism Joy Judging Justice Kissing Knowledge Language Laughter Learning Liberty Life Literature Logic Love Lying Marriage Military Money Moon Morality Music Nature Office Originality Passion Past Patriotism Peace Personality Philosophy Politics Pot Poverty Prejudice Progress Propaganda Quality Quitting Reading Religion Respect Revolution Running Safety School Science Science And Religion Skins Slavery Society Son Sports Struggle Stupidity Style Success Suffering Sunday Sympathy Teaching Temptation Time Today Tragedy Trust Truth Virtue Voting Waiting War Water Weakness Wife Wisdom Work Writing Youth

There is something even more valuable to civilization than wisdom, and that is character.

There is something even more valuable to civilization than wisdom, and that is character.

Character, Civilization, Religion

There are two kinds of Europeans: The smart ones, and those who stayed behind.

Smart, Two, Kind

It is the dull man who is always sure, and the sure man who is always dull.

Faith, Men, Dull

H.L. Mencken (1920). “Prejudices Second Series”

If the average man is made in God's image, then a man such as Beethoven or Aristotle is plainly superior to God, and so God may be jealous of him, and eager to see his superiority perish with his bodily frame.

Men, Average, Made

"In Defense of Women: Human Sexuality".

Remorse - Regret that one waited so long to do it.

Freedom, Regret, Long

"A Mencken Chrestomathy". Book by H. L. Mencken, 1949.

There is only one justification for having sinned, and that is to be glad of it.

Religion, Liberty, Morality

"A little book in C major".

The argument that capital punishment degrades the state is moonshine, for if that were true then it would degrade the state to send men to war... The state, in truth, is degraded in its very nature: a few butcheries cannot do it any further damage.

Freedom, War, Men

Politics, as hopeful men practise it in the world, consists mainly of the delusion that a change in form is a change in substance.

Men, Hopeful, Substance

H.L. MENCKEN (1958). “PREJUDICES A SELECTION”

It is the theory of all modern civilized governments that they protect and foster the liberty of the citizen; it is the practice of all of them to limit its exercise, and sometimes very narrowly.

Exercise, Government, Practice

To die for an idea; it is unquestionably noble. But how much nobler it would be if men died for ideas that were true!

Wisdom, Men, Ideas

The only way for a reporter to look at a politician is down.

Looks, Way, Politician

It is impossible to imagine Goethe or Beethoven being good at billiards or golf.

Sports, Golf, Gambling

Theology is the effort to explain the unknowable in terms of the not worth knowing.

Knowing, Effort, Literature

Since the early days, [the church] has thrown itself violently against every effort to liberate the body and mind of man. It has been, at all times and everywhere, the habitual and incorrigible defender of bad governments, bad laws, bad social theories, bad institutions. It was, for centuries, an apologist for slavery, as it was an apologist for the divine right of kings.

Kings, Men, Law

I confess I enjoy democracy immensely. It is incomparably idiotic, and hence incomparably amusing.

Democracy, Amusing, Enjoy

H.L. Mencken (2012). “Mencken Chrestomathy”, p.168, Vintage

The cosmos is a gigantic flywheel making 10,000 revolutions per minute. Man is a sick fly taking a dizzy ride on it.

Freedom, Men, Sick

Smart Set, Dec. 1920

A sense of humor always withers in the presence of the messianic delusion, like justice and the truth in front of patriotic passion.

Passion, Humor, Patriotic

"H.L. Mencken: Prejudices: First, Second, and Third Series".

No healthy man, in his secret heart, is content with his destiny. He is tortured by dreams and images as a child is tortured by the thought of a state of existence in which it would live in a candy store and have two stomachs.

Dream, Children, Heart

H.L. Mencken (2012). “Mencken Chrestomathy”, p.325, Vintage

All American wars (except the Civil War) have been fought with the odds overwhelmingly in favor of the Americans. In the history of armed combat such affairs as the Mexican and Spanish-American Wars must be ranked, not as wars at all, but as organized assassinations. In the two World Wars, no American faced a bullet until his adversaries had been worn down by years of fighting others.

Peace, War, Fighting

We must respect the other fellow's religion, but only in the sense and to the extent that we respect his theory that his wife is beautiful and his children smart.

Beautiful, Respect, Religious

Minority Report: H. L. Mencken's Notebooks (1956)

For it is an absurdity to call a country civilized in which a decent and industrious man, laboriously mastering a trade which is valuble and necessary to the common weal, has no assurance that it will sustain him while he stands ready to practice it, or keep him out of the poorhouse when illness or age makes him idle.

Country, Men, Practice

The theory behind representative government is that superior men-or at least men not inferior to the average in ability and integrity-are chosen to manage the public business, and that they carry on this work with reasonable intelligence and honest. There is little support for that theory in known facts.

Integrity, Men, Average

Happiness is peace after strife, the overcoming of difficulties, the feeling of security and well-being. The only really happy folk are married women and single men.

Happiness, Marriage, Men

The most costly of all follies is to believe passionately in the palpably not true. It is the chief occupation of mankind.

Believe, Religion, Occupation

Prejudices (1926).

School days, I believe, are the unhappiest in the whole span of human existence.

Education, Believe, Learning

H.L. Mencken (2012). “Mencken Chrestomathy”, p.308, Vintage

You May Also Like: