The finest clothing made is a person's own skin, but, of course, society demands something more than this.

I have been cautioned to talk but be careful not to say anything. I do not consider this a difficult task.

I can understand German as well as the maniac that invented it, but I talk it best through an interpreter.

You can't reason with your heart; it has its own laws, and thumps about things which the intellect scorns.

Who knows, he may grow up to be President someday, unless they hang him first!" Aunt Polly about Tom Sawyer

There are two times in a man's life when he should not speculate: when he can't afford it, and when he can.

The exquisitely bad is as satisfying to the soul as the exquisitely good. Only the mediocre is unendurable.

Just because you’re taught that something’s right and everyone believes it’s right, it don’t make it right.

Why is it that we rejoice at a birth and grieve at a funeral? It is because we are not the person involved.

If you send a damned fool to St. Louis, and you don't tell them he's a damned fool, they'll never find out.

George Washington, as a boy, was ignorant of the commonest accomplishments of youth. He could not even lie.

Religion consists in a set of things which the average man thinks he believes and wishes he was certain of.

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

I never did a thing in all my life, virtuous or otherwise that I didn't repent of within twenty-four hours.

If you should rear a duck in the heart of the Sahara, no doubt it would swim if you brought it to the Nile.

Biographies are but the clothes and buttons of the man. The biography of the man himself cannot be written.

Education: that which reveals to the wise, and conceals from the stupid, the vast limits of their knowledge.

The only people who should use the possessive 'we' are kings, newspaper editors, and persons with tapeworms.

Analyzing humor is like dissecting a frog: Nobody really enjoys it, and the frog generally dies as a result.

There ought to be a room in every house to swear in. It's dangerous to have to repress an emotion like that.

The human race was always interesting and we know by its past that it will always continue so, monotonously.

If you don't know how to pronounce a word, say it loudly. Do not compound mispronunciation with inaudibility

A man has no business to be depressed by a disappointment, anyway; he ought to make up his mind to get even.

We need not worry so much about what man descends from; it's what he descends to that shames the human race.

It is curious and interesting to notice what an attraction a fussy, mincing, nickel-plated word has for you.

Broad, wholesome, charitable views .. can not be acquired by vegetating in one's little corner of the earth.

Truth is stranger than fiction, but it is because Fiction is obliged to stick to possibilities; Truth isn't.

It is my belief that nearly any invented quotation, played with confidence, stands a good chance to deceive.

One holds a bottle of red wine by the neck, a woman by the waist, and a bottle of champagne by the derriere.

Women cannot receive even the most palpably judicious suggestion without arguing it; that is, married women.

I have traveled more than anyone else, and I have noticed that even the angels speak English with an accent.

Drag your thoughts away from your troubles... by the ears, by the heels, or any other way you can manage it.

There is no unhappiness like the misery of sighting land (and work) again after a cheerful, careless voyage.

Habit is habit, and not to be flung out of the window by any man, but coaxed down-stairs one step at a time.

I admire him, I frankly confess it; and when his time is come I shall buy a piece of the rope for a keepsake.

The happy phrasing of a compliment is one of the rarest of human gifts, and the happy delivery of it another.

April 1. This is the day upon which we are reminded of what we are on the other three hundred and sixty-four.

The report of my illness grew out of his (James Clemens) illness. The report of my death was an exaggeration.

Gratitude is a debt which usually goes on accumulating like blackmail; the more you pay, the more is exacted.

Do not offer a compliment and ask a favor at the same time. A compliment that is charged for is not valuable.

The jury system puts a ban upon intelligence and honesty and a premium upon ignorance, stupidity and perjury.

Explaining humor is a lot like dissecting a frog, you learn a lot in the process, but in the end you kill it.

The cat, having sat upon a hot stove lid, will not sit upon a hot stove lid again. Nor upon a cold stove lid.

I do not want Michael Angelo for breakfast-but for luncheon-for dinner- for tea-for supper-for between meals.

I am a great and sublime fool. But then I am God's fool, and all His works must be contemplated with respect.

Good judgment comes from experience. And where does experience come from? Experience comes from bad judgment.

Why waste your money looking up your family tree? Just go into politics and your opponent will do it for you.

I knew a man who grabbed a cat by the tail and learned forty percent more about cats than the man who didn't.

To be vested with enormous authority is a fine thing; but to have the on-looking world consent to it is finer.

The devil's aversion to holy water is a light matter compared with a despots dread of a newspaper that laughs.

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