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H. L. Mencken Quotes - Page 4

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The chief difference between free capitalism and State socialism seems to be this: that under the former a man pursues his own advantage openly, frankly and honestly, whereas under the latter he does so hypocritically

The chief difference between free capitalism and State socialism seems to be this: that under the former a man pursues his own advantage openly, frankly and honestly, whereas under the latter he does so hypocritically and under false pretenses.

Men, Differences, Doe

H.L. Mencken (2013). “Minority Report”, p.397, Knopf

One horse-laugh is worth ten-thousand syllogisms.

Horse, Laughing, Thousand

H.L. Mencken (2012). “Mencken Chrestomathy”, p.17, Vintage

The final test of truth is ridicule. Very few dogmas have ever faced it and survived.

Finals, Tests, Dogma

H.L. Mencken (1918). “Damn”, p.74, Рипол Классик

A judge is a law student who marks his own examination papers.

Funny, Law, Justice

[T]he only thing wrong with Abraham Lincoln's Gettysburg Address was that it was the South, not the North, that was fighting for a government of the people, by the people and for the people.

Fighting, Government, People

The legislature, like the executive, has ceased to be even the creature of the people: it is the creature of pressure groups, and most of them, it must be manifest, are of dubious wisdom and even more dubious honesty. Laws are no longer made by a rational process of public discussion; they are made by a process of blackmail and intimidation, and they are executed in the same manner. The typical lawmaker of today is a man wholly devoid of principle...

Honesty, Men, Law

A fool who, after plain warning, persists in dosing himself with dangerous drugs should be free to do so, for his death is a benefit to the race in general.

Race, Political, Drug

H.L. Mencken (2013). “Minority Report”, p.423, Knopf

The American people, North and South, went into the [Civil] war as citizens of their respective states, they came out as subjects ... what they thus lost they have never got back.

War, People, Liberty

My belief in free speech is so profound that I am seldom tempted to deny it to the other fellow. Nor do I make any effort to differentiate between the other fellow right and that other fellow wrong, for I am convinced that free speech is worth nothing unless it includes a full franchise to be foolish and even...malicious.

Profound, Effort, Speech

H.L. Mencken (2011). “My Life as Author and Editor”, p.29, Vintage

The more noisy Negro leaders, by depicting all whites as natural and implacable enemies to their race, have done it a great disservice. Large numbers of whites who were formerly very friendly to it, and willing to go to great lengths to help it, are now resentful and suspicious.

Numbers, Race, Leader

H.L. Mencken (2013). “Minority Report”, p.213, Knopf

The older I get the more I admire and crave competence, just simple competence, in any field from adultery to zoology.

Simple, Fields, Adultery

The art of politics, under democracy, is simply the art of ringing it. Two branches reveal themselves. There is the art of the demagogue, and there is the art of what may be called, by a shot-gun marriage of Latin and Greek, the demaslave. They are complementary, and both of them are degrading to their practitioners. The demagogue is one who preaches doctrines he knows to be untrue to men he knows to be idiots. The demaslave is one who listens to what these idiots have to say and then pretends that he believes it himself.

Art, Latin, Believe

Never argue with a man whose job depends on not being convinced.

Jobs, Men, Arguing

Unsuccessful candidates for the Presidency should be quietly hanged as a matter of public sanitation and decorum.

Matter, Decorum, Should

[The] erroneous assumption is to the effect that the aim of public education is to fill the young of the species with knowledge and awaken their intelligence, and so make them fit to discharge the duties of citizenship in an enlightened and independent manner. Nothing could be further from the truth. The aim of public education is not to spread enlightenment at all; it is simply to reduce as many individuals as possible to the same safe level, to breed and train a standardised citizenry, to put down dissent and originality.

Knowledge, Independent, Science

Government is actually the worst failure of civilized man.

Men, Liberty, Arbitrary

H.L. Mencken (2013). “Minority Report”, p.69, Knopf

If I had my way, any man guilty of golf would be ineligible for any office of trust in the United States.

Golf, Men, Office

The most popular man under a democracy is not the most democratic man, but the most despotic man. The common folk delight in the exactions of such a man. They like him to boss them. Their natural gait is the goose step.

Men, Common Folk, Boss

H. L. Mencken, Marion Elizabeth Rodgers (2010). “H.L. Mencken: Prejudices: First, Second, and Third Series”, Hubsta Ltd

Well, I tell you, if I have been wrong in my agnosticism, when I die I'll walk up to God in a manly way and say, Sir, I made an honest mistake.

Atheist, Honesty, Mistake

What men value in this world is not rights but privileges.

Leadership, Men, Rights

H.L. Mencken (2013). “Minority Report”, p.34, Knopf

The trouble with fighting for human freedom is that one spends most of one's time defending scoundrels. For it is against scoundrels that oppressive laws are first aimed, and oppression must be stopped at the beginning if it is to be stopped at all.

Time, Freedom, Fighting

"Shut Down Chick-fil-A Properly" by James Peron, www.huffingtonpost.com. July 25, 2012.

Every election is a sort of advance auction sale of stolen goods.

Liberty, Auctions, Politics

"Prejudices: First Series". Book by H. L. Mencken, 1919.

People say we need religion when what they really mean is we need police.

Atheist, Mean, People

And what is a good citizen? Simply one who never says, does or thinks anything that is unusual. Schools are maintained in order to bring this uniformity up to the highest possible point. A school is a hopper into which children are heaved while they are still young and tender; therein they are pressed into certain standard shapes and covered from head to heels with official rubber-stamps.

Children, School, Thinking

The ideal Government of all reflective men, from Aristotle onward, is one which lets the individual alone - one which barely escapes being no government at all.

Men, Liberty, Libertarian

H.L. Mencken (2012). “Mencken Chrestomathy”, p.146, Vintage

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