H. L. Mencken ( 10 of 103 )
Temptation is a woman's weapon and man's excuse.
Temptation is a woman's weapon and man's excuse.
The only good bureaucrat is one with a pistol at his head. Put it in his hand and it's good-by read more
The only good bureaucrat is one with a pistol at his head. Put it in his hand and it's good-by to the Bill of Rights.
No one in this world, so far as I know- and I have researched the records for years, and employed read more
No one in this world, so far as I know- and I have researched the records for years, and employed agents to help me- has ever lost money by underestimating the intelligence of the great masses of the plain people. Nor has anyone ever lost public office thereby.
It is the invariable habit of bureaucracies, at all times and everywhere, to assume...that every citizen is a criminal. Their read more
It is the invariable habit of bureaucracies, at all times and everywhere, to assume...that every citizen is a criminal. Their one apparent purpose, pursued with a relentless and furious diligence, is to convert the assumption into a fact. They hunt endlessly for proofs, and, when proofs are lacking, for mere suspicions. The moment they become aware of a definite citizen, John Doe, seeking what is his right under the law, they begin searching feverishly for an excuse for withholding it from him.
Puritanism: The haunting fear that someone, somewhere, may be happy.
Puritanism: The haunting fear that someone, somewhere, may be happy.
Strike an average between what a woman thinks of her husband a month before she marries him and what she read more
Strike an average between what a woman thinks of her husband a month before she marries him and what she thinks of him a year afterward, and you will have the truth about him. -H.L. Mencken.
The average man does not get pleasure out of an idea because he thinks it is true; he thinks it read more
The average man does not get pleasure out of an idea because he thinks it is true; he thinks it is true because he gets pleasure out of it.
The most costly of all follies is to believe passionately in the palpably not true. It is the chief occupation read more
The most costly of all follies is to believe passionately in the palpably not true. It is the chief occupation of mankind.
There is only one honest impulse at the bottom of Puritanism, and that is the impulse to punish the man read more
There is only one honest impulse at the bottom of Puritanism, and that is the impulse to punish the man with a superior capacity for happiness.
Every step in human progress, from the first feeble stirrings in the abyss of time, has been opposed by the read more
Every step in human progress, from the first feeble stirrings in the abyss of time, has been opposed by the great majority of men. Every valuable thing that has been added to the store of man's possessions has been derided by them when it was new, and destroyed by them when they had the power. They have fought every new truth ever heard of, and they have killed every truth-seeker who got into their hands.
