Mark Twain

I didn't have time to write a short letter, so I wrote a long one instead.

A banker is a fellow who lends you his umbrella when the sun is shining, but wants it back the minute it begins to rain.

Out of all the things I have lost, I miss my mind the most.

Never argue with stupid people, they will drag you down to their level and then beat you with experience.

“A God who could make good children as easily a bad, yet preferred to make bad ones; who could have made every one of them happy, yet never made a single happy one; who made them prize their bitter life, yet stingily cut it short; who gave his angels eternal happiness unearned, yet required his other children to earn it; who gave is angels painless lives, yet cursed his other children with biting miseries and maladies of mind and body; who mouths justice, and invented hell--mouths mercy, and invented hell--mouths Golden Rules and forgiveness multiplied by seventy times seven, and invented hell; who mouths morals to other people, and has none himself; who frowns upon crimes, yet commits them all; who created man without invitation, then tries to shuffle the responsibility for man's acts upon man, instead of honorably placing it where it belongs, upon himself; and finally, with altogether divine obtuseness, invites his poor abused slave to worship him!”

Giving up smoking is the easiest thing in the world. I know because I've done it thousands of times.

There is a charm about the forbidden that makes it unspeakably desirable.

It's easier to fool people than to convince them that they have been fooled.

Reality can be beaten with enough imagination.

I have a higher and grander standard of principle than George Washington. He could not lie; I can, but I won't.

Education consists mainly of what we have unlearned.

“I lost Susy thirteen years ago; I lost her mother--her incomparable mother!--five and a half years ago; Clara has gone away to live in Europe and now I have lost Jean. How poor I am, who was once so rich! . . . Jean lies yonder, I sit here; we are strangers under our own roof; we kissed hands good-by at this door last night--and it was forever, we never suspecting it. She lies there, and I sit here--writing, busying myself, to keep my heart from breaking. How dazzling the sunshine is flooding the hills around! It is like a mockery. Seventy-four years ago twenty-four days. Seventy-four years old yesterday. Who can estimate my age today?”

Many public-school children seem to know only two dates—1492 and 4th of July; and as a rule they don't know what happened on either occasion.

There is no such thing as a new idea. It is impossible. We simply take a lot of old ideas and put them into a sort of mental kaleidoscope. We give them a turn and they make new and curious combinations. We keep on turning and making new combinations indefinitely; but they are the same old pieces of colored glass that have been in use through all the ages.

It is by the goodness of god that in our country we have those 3 unspeakably precious things: freedom of speech, freedom of conscience, and the prudence never to practice either of them.

A home without a cat — and a well-fed, well-petted and properly revered cat — may be a perfect home, perhaps, but how can it prove title?

what is joy without sorrow? what is success without failure? what is a win without a loss? what is health without illness? you have to experience each if you are to appreciate the other. there is always going to be suffering. it’s how you look at your suffering, how you deal with it, that will define you.

I notice that you use plain, simple language, short words and brief sentences. That is the way to write English―it is the modern way and the best way. Stick to it; don't let fluff and flowers and verbosity creep in. When you catch an adjective, kill it. No, I don't mean utterly, but kill most of them―then the rest will be valuable. They weaken when they are close together. They give strength when they are wide apart. An adjective habit, or a wordy, diffuse, flowery habit, once fastened upon a person, is as hard to get rid of as any other vice.

Don’t you know what that is? It’s spring fever. That is what the name of it is. And when you’ve got it, you want—oh, you don’t quite know what it is you DO want, but it just fairly makes your heart ache, you want it so!

Let us consider that we are all partially insane. It will explain us to each other; it will unriddle many riddles; it will make clear and simple many things which are involved in haunting and harassing difficulties and obscurities now.

The lack of money is the root of all evil.

We may not pay Satan reverence, for that would be indiscreet, but we can at least respect his talents.

The older I get, the more clearly I remember things that never happened.

A big leather-bound volume makes an ideal razorstrap. A thing book is useful to stick under a table with a broken caster to steady it. A large, flat atlas can be used to cover a window with a broken pane. And a thick, old-fashioned heavy book with a clasp is the finest thing in the world to throw at a noisy cat.

In religion and politics people’s beliefs and convictions are in almost every case gotten at second-hand, and without examination, from authorities who have not themselves examined the questions at issue but have taken them at second-hand from other non-examiners, whose opinions about them were not worth a brass farthing.

Censorship is telling a man he can't have a steak just because a baby can't chew it.

I thoroughly disapprove of duels. If a man should challenge me, I would take him kindly and forgivingly by the hand and lead him to a quiet place and kill him.

When I was younger, I could remember anything, whether it had happened or not; but my faculties are decaying now and soon I shall be so I cannot remember any but the things that never happened. It is sad to go to pieces like this but we all have to do it.

The fact that man knows right from wrong proves his intellectual superiority to the other creatures; but the fact that he can do wrong proves his moral inferiority to any creatures that cannot.

Life does not consist mainly, or even largely, of facts or happenings. It consist mainly of the storm of thoughts that is forever flowing through one's head.

Unconsciously we all have a standard by which we measure other men, and if we examine closely we find that this standard is a very simple one, and is this: we admire them, we envy them, for great qualities we ourselves lack. Hero worship consists in just that. Our heroes are men who do things which we recognize, with regret, and sometimes with a secret shame, that we cannot do. We find not much in ourselves to admire, we are always privately wanting to be like somebody else. If everybody was satisfied with himself, there would be no heroes.

Too much of anything is bad, but too much good whiskey is barely enough.

The secret of getting ahead is getting started. The secret of getting started is breaking your complex overwhelming tasks into small manageable tasks, and starting on the first one.

The government is merely a servant―merely a temporary servant; it cannot be its prerogative to determine what is right and what is wrong, and decide who is a patriot and who isn't. Its function is to obey orders, not originate them.

Write without pay until somebody offers to pay.

There was never yet an uninteresting life. Such a thing is an impossibility. Inside of the dullest exterior there is a drama, a comedy, and a tragedy.

Thunder is good, thunder is impressive; but it is lightning that does the work.

There isn't time, so brief is life, for bickerings, apologies, heartburnings, callings to account. There is only time for loving, and but an instant, so to speak, for that.

A person that started in to carry a cat home by the tail was getting knowledge that was always going to be useful to him, and warn't ever going to grow dim or doubtful.

Adam was but human—this explains it all. He did not want the apple for the apple's sake, he wanted it only because it was forbidden. The mistake was in not forbidding the serpent; then he would have eaten the serpent.

Eat a live frog first thing in the morning and nothing worse will happen to you the rest of the day.

Of all God's creatures, there is only one that cannot be made slave of the leash. That one is the cat. If man could be crossed with the cat it would improve the man, but it would deteriorate the cat.

Man is the Reasoning Animal. Such is the claim. I think it is open to dispute. Indeed, my experiments have proven to me that he is the Unreasoning Animal... In truth, man is incurably foolish. Simple things which other animals easily learn, he is incapable of learning. Among my experiments was this. In an hour I taught a cat and a dog to be friends. I put them in a cage. In another hour I taught them to be friends with a rabbit. In the course of two days I was able to add a fox, a goose, a squirrel and some doves. Finally a monkey. They lived together in peace; even affectionately.

You believe in a book that has talking animals, wizards, witches, demons, sticks turning into snakes, burning bushes, food falling from the sky, people walking on water, and all sorts of magical, absurd and primitive stories, and you say that we are the ones that need help?

Forgiveness is the fragrance that the violet sheds on the heel that has crushed it.

Never be haughty to the humble, never be humble to the haughty.

One of the most striking differences between a cat and a lie is that a cat has only nine lives.

Good friends, good books, and a sleepy conscience: this is the ideal life.

Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it is time to reform (or pause and reflect).

The man who does not read has no advantage over the man who cannot read.

Never put off till tomorrow what may be done day after tomorrow just as well.

′Classic′ - a book which people praise and don't read.

I have never let my schooling interfere with my education.

Substitute 'damn' every time you're inclined to write 'very;' your editor will delete it and the writing will be just as it should be.

Reader, suppose you were an idiot. And suppose you were a member of Congress. But I repeat myself.

Don’t go around saying the world owes you a living. The world owes you nothing. It was here first.

I did not attend his funeral, but I sent a nice letter saying I approved of it.

God created war so that Americans would learn geography.

I was gratified to be able to answer promptly, and I did. I said I didn’t know.

Never allow someone to be your priority while allowing yourself to be their option.

But who prays for Satan? Who, in eighteen centuries, has had the common humanity to pray for the one sinner that needed it most?

The difference between the

Loyalty to country ALWAYS. Loyalty to government, when it deserves it.

Wrinkles should merely indicate where the smiles have been.

Books are for people who wish they were somewhere else.

Don't part with your illusions. When they are gone you may still exist, but you have ceased to live.

I wish I could make him understand that a loving good heart is riches enough, and that without it intellect is poverty.

Conservatism is the blind and fear-filled worship of dead radicals.

The radical of one century is the conservative of the next. The radical invents the views. When he has worn them out, the conservative adopt.

The only difference between reality and fiction is that fiction needs to be credible.

When people do not respect us we are sharply offended; yet deep down in his private heart no man much respects himself.

December is the toughest month of the year. Others are July, January, September, April, November, May, March, June, October, August, and February.

I take my only exercise acting as a pallbearer at the funerals of my friends who exercise regularly.

It is easier to stay out than to get out.

A man's character may be learned from the adjectives which he habitually uses in conversation.

I can last two months on a good compliment.

A man is accepted into a church for what he believes and he is turned out for what he knows.

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

There are several good protections against temptations, but the surest is cowardice.

I always take Scotch whiskey at night as a preventive of toothache. I have never had the toothache; and what is more, I never intend to have it.

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

Find a job you enjoy doing, and you will never have to work a day in your life.

Most writers regard the truth as their most valuable possession, and therefore are economical in its use.

If books are not good company, where shall I find it?

Hain't we got all the fools in town on our side? And hain't that a big enough majority in any town?

Whiskey is for drinking; water is for fighting over.

When in doubt tell the truth. It will confound your enemies and astound your friends.

The only difference between a tax man and a taxidermist is that the taxidermist leaves the skin.

Ah, if he could only die temporarily!

Man was made at the end of the week's work when God was tired.

Never have a battle of wits with an unarmed person.

New Orleans food is as delicious as the less criminal forms of sin.

Plain question and plain answer make the shortest road out of most perplexities.

High and fine literature is wine, and mine is only water; but everybody likes water.

If man could be crossed with a cat, it would improve man but deteriorate the cat.

If we would learn what the human race really is at bottom, we need only observe it in election times.

Give every day the chance to become the most beautiful day of your life.

Every person is a book, each year a chapter,

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

Work like you don't need the money. Dance like no one is watching. And love like you've never been hurt.