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Mark Twain Quotes - Page 84

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The business aspects of the Fourth of July is not perfect as it stands. See what it costs us every year with loss of life, the crippling of thousands with its fireworks, and the burning down of property. It is not only

The business aspects of the Fourth of July is not perfect as it stands. See what it costs us every year with loss of life, the crippling of thousands with its fireworks, and the burning down of property. It is not only sacred to patriotism and universal freedom, but to the surgeon, the undertaker, the insurance offices - and they are working it for all it is worth.

Mark Twain
4th Of July, Loss, Years
Mark Twain (2016). “Mark Twain's Speeches”, p.263, Xist Publishing

Whatever a man's age, he can reduce it several years by putting a bright-colored flower in his button-hole.

Mark Twain
Flower, Men, Years
Mark Twain (2017). “MARK TWAIN: 12 Novels, 195 Short Stories, Autobiography, 10 Travel Books, 160+ Essays & Speeches (Illustrated): Including Letters & Biographies – The Complete Works of Mark Twain: The Adventures of Tom Sawyer & Huckleberry Finn, The Innocents Abroad, Yankee in King Arthur's Court, Life on the Mississippi…”, p.1907, e-artnow

Life was a fairy-tale, then, it is a tragedy now. When I was 43 and John Hay 41 he said life was a tragedy after 40, and I disputed it. Three years ago he asked me to testify again: I counted my graves, and there was nothing for me to say. I am old; I recognize it but I don't realize it. I wonder if a person ever really ceases to feel young - I mean, for a whole day at a time.

Mark Twain
Mean, Said Life, Years
Mark Twain (2014). “Mark Twain’s Letters & Speeches (Annotated Edition)”, p.898, Jazzybee Verlag

Evolution is a blind giant who rolls a snowball down a hill. The ball is made of flakes-circumstances. They contribute to the mass without knowing it. They adhere without intention, and without foreseeing what is to result. When they see the result they marvel at the monster ball and wonder how the contriving of it came to be originally thought out and planned. Whereas there was no such planning, there was only a law: the ball once started, all the circumstances that happened to lie in its path would help to build it, in spite of themselves.

Mark Twain
Lying, Law, Knowing

Very well, then, where do we arrive? Where do we arrive with our respect, our homage, our filial affection? At Adam! At Adam, every time. We can't build a monument to a germ, but we can build one to Adam, who is in the way to turn myth in in fifty years and be entirely forgotten in two hundred. We can build a monument and save his name to the world forever, and we'll do it!

Mark Twain
Years, Names, Two

You can never find a Christian who has acquired this valuable knowledge, this saving knowledge, by any process but the everlasting and all-sufficient 'people say.'

Mark Twain
Christian, People, Atheism
Mark Twain (2015). “Autobiography of Mark Twain, Volume 3: The Complete and Authoritative Edition”, p.253, Univ of California Press

There will never be a "perfect" time to quit smoking. A time when you don't have any distractions or stress... If you had started today one year ago, this would not even be an issue for you today! Don't waste another year!

Mark Twain
Encouragement, Stress, Issues

Each man is afraid of his neighbor's disapproval - a thing which, to the general run of the human race, is more dreaded than wolves and death.

Mark Twain
Death, Running, Fear
Mark Twain (1972). “Everyone's Mark Twain”

You can't make a life over. Society wouldn't let you if you would.

Mark Twain
Life, Society, Ifs
Mark Twain (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Mark Twain (Illustrated)”, p.276, Delphi Classics

This morning arrives a letter from my ancient silver-mining comrade, Calvin H. Higbie, a man whom I have not seen nor had communication with for forty-four years. . . . [Footnote: Roughing It is dedicated to Higbie.] . . . I shall allow myself the privilege of copying his punctuation and his spelling, for to me they are a part of the man. He is as honest as the day is long. He is utterly simple-minded and straightforward, and his spelling and his punctuation are as simple and honest as he is himself. He makes no apology for them, and no apology is needed.

Mark Twain
Morning, Communication, Apology

I can't do no literary work for the rest of this year because I'm meditating another lawsuit and looking around for a defendant.

Mark Twain
Work, Writing, Years

I could have become a soldier if I had waited; I knew more about retreating than the man who invented retreating.

Mark Twain
Funny, Military, Humorous
Mark Twain (2014). “Mark Twain on Common Sense: Timeless Advice and Words of Wisdom from America's Most-Revered Humorist”, p.60, Skyhorse Publishing, Inc.

More than one cigar at a time is excessive smoking.

Mark Twain
Time, Smoking, Cigar
Mark Twain (2012). “The Wit and Wisdom of Mark Twain: A Book of Quotations”, p.60, Courier Corporation

I will remark in the way of general information, that in California, that land of felicitous nomenclature, the literary name of this sort of stuff is "hogwash"

Mark Twain
Land, Names, California
Mark Twain, Charles Neider (1961). “Life as I find it [by] Mark Twain [pseud.] Essays, sketches, tales, and other material, the majority of which is now published in book form for the first time: edited, with an introd. and notes”

Between believing a thing and thinking you KNOW is only a small step and quickly taken.

Mark Twain
Believe, Taken, Thinking
Mark Twain (2003). “Tales of Wonder”, p.322, U of Nebraska Press

The timid man yearns for full value and demands a tenth. The bold man strikes for double value and compromises on par.

Mark Twain
Business, Men, Double Standard
Following the Equator ch. 13, "Pudd'nhead Wilson's New Calendar" (1897)

Warm summer sun, shine kindly here.

Mark Twain
Summer, Shining, Sun
Mark Twain, General Press (2016). “The Complete Works of Mark Twain: All 13 Novels, Short Stories, Poetry and Essays”, p.3018, GENERAL PRESS

The humorous story is American, the comic story is English, the witty story is French. The humorous story depends for its effect upon the manner of the telling;the comic and the witty story upon the matter.

Mark Twain
Witty, Humorous, Stories
Mark Twain (2012). “Humorous Stories and Sketches”, p.70, Courier Corporation

A man may have no bad habits and have worse

Mark Twain
Men, May, Habit
Mark Twain (2015). “Bite-Size Twain: Wit and Wisdom from the Literary Legend”, p.83, St. Martin's Press

There is nothing that saps one's confidence as the knowing how to do a thing

Mark Twain
Confidence, Knowing, Sap
Mark Twain (2014). “Mark Twain on Common Sense: Timeless Advice and Words of Wisdom from America's Most-Revered Humorist”, p.45, Skyhorse Publishing, Inc.

I have learned that human existence is essentially tragic. It is only the love of God, disclosed and enacted in Christ, that redeems the human tragedy and makes it tolerable. No, more than tolerable. Wonderful.

Mark Twain
Humanity, Tragedy, Wonderful

The piano may do for love-sick girls who lace themselves to skeletons, and lunch on chalk, pickles and slate pencils, but give me the banjo.

Mark Twain
Girl, Skeletons, Lunch
Mark Twain (1979). “Early Tales and Sketches 1864-1869”, p.235, Univ of California Press

In the South the war is what A.D. is elsewhere; they date from it.

Mark Twain
War, Southern, Elsewhere
1883 Of the American Civil War. Life on the Mississippi, ch.45.

But we are all insane, anyway. Note the mountain-climbers.

Mark Twain
Insanity, Insane, Mountain
Mark Twain (2012). “Mark Twain at Your Fingertips: A Book of Quotations”, p.298, Courier Corporation

Really, what we want now, is not laws against crime, but a law against insanity. That is where the true evil lies.

Mark Twain
Lying, True Evil, Law
Mark Twain, General Press (2016). “The Complete Works of Mark Twain: All 13 Novels, Short Stories, Poetry and Essays”, p.2441, GENERAL PRESS

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